Category: Reviews

Review: Damaged Bug – Bug on Yonkers

Michael Yonkers is an outsider musician who has plenty of legend and mystery floating around him – he built all his own gear, he was in constant pain from a spinal injury, and that he invented drone rock in the late 1960s and early 1970s before anyone knew what it was.

This kind of stuff is gold to music lovers like yours truly and John Dwyer of Damaged Bug and Osees. Dwyer decided to record an entire Damaged Bug album covering Yonkers’ music. The result, Bug on Yonkers, is a great tribute to Yonkers’ work and unveils how much of an influence the man is on Dwyer’s work.

Starting with a synth-driven ballad of “Goodby Sunball” (the title track to Yonkers’ 1974 album), Dwyer and frequent collaborator Brigid Dawson sing about not understanding life and existence (and knowing it must and will continue). Their cover of “I Tried” is a fuzzy, slightly sloppy, and groovy delight (with Dwyer playing flute at one point) and lyrics about trying to salvage a relationship that’s doomed to failure because the other half has given up on it. “Just take your slippers out from under my bed, and never let me see you alive or dead.” Insert mic drop here.

“Microminiature Love” moves along with a garage rock swagger propelled by the bass line Dwyer lays down and the steady, sweaty beats by Nick Murray. “Sold America” is sweet psychedelia with big synths and even bigger cymbal crashes and drum fills. “The Thunder Speaks” is the biggest rocker on the record. It’s a wall of solid grooves coming at you with only a few moments for breath.

“Sunflower” is a much quieter affair, with Dawson taking the lead on vocals and Brad Caulkins playing a jazz saxophone that almost sounds like it wandered in from another song. “Lovely Gold” (the title track to Yonkers’ 2010 album) is a mix of synthwave, psychedelic rock, and barely contained mania. In other words, it’s great. “Smile a While” mixes toms, cymbals, synth warps, and plenty of reverb for a trippy track. The album closes with “In My Heart,” a lovely track of psych-folk that hums like a happy bumblebee buzzing along a California beach while whales surface on the sunlit horizon.

This record will make you search for Yonkers’ material, as any good tribute album should. It’s also a fine addition to Damaged Bug’s catalogue and John Dwyer’s library.

Keep your mind open.

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Review: New Bomb Turks – Nightmare Scenario: Diamond Edition (2020 reissue)

As the story goes, Columbus, Ohio punk legends New Bomb Turks were musing over how to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their Nightmare Scenario album, and wondered if the album’s original engineer, Jim Diamond, still had the master tapes from the four-day recording session in Detroit. It turns out that he did, and NBT discovered they were as raw and rowdy as they’d hoped. The result is the “Diamond Edition” of the album, and it’s a welcome birthday gift for all of us.

Opener “Point A to Point Blank” grabs you by the collar and tosses you into the mosh pit with its furious drumming by Sam Brown and Jim Weber‘s guitar is the sound of a nitro-burning funny car launching off the line. “Automatic Teller” has Eric Davidson singing about his girl “always come runnin’ every payday” to turn him into an ATM while the rest of the band goes bonkers with tight punk riffs. Matt Reber‘s bass line on it is a thing of wonder.

“End of the Great Credibility Race” has, apart from a great title, slick back and forth vocals between Davidson and his bandmates in-between all the powerful riffs. Davidson encourages Brown to “go as fast as you fuckin’ wanna go” on “Too Much,” which packs more punk pedal-to-the-metal punch into a minute and three seconds than most songs three times that length.

“Killer’s Kiss” throws down a sweet groove and is a good display of NBT’s diversity. They can unleash blazing punk licks and garage rock grooves with equal talent. It’s one of their best traits. “Continental Cats” is another fine example of how NBT love to find and lock into a groove now and then, but without letting off the gas and fuzz pedals. “Spanish Fly by Night” displays another NBT talent – wordplay. They have some of the wittiest and sharpest lyrics of any punk rock band you’ll find.

“The Roof” is a solid song about being stuck in a dead end town and wishing for greener pastures elsewhere. The “rough mix” of “Your Beaten Heart” is a neat addition. It’s cool to hear the early, raw version of this. “Turning Tricks” has a wild, swaggering flair to it – as you’d want from a song with that title – and I love how Reber’s bass shoves its way to the front now and then on the track.

There’s no way NBT could’ve predicted in 2000 that “Wine & Depression” could be a theme song for 2020, but here we are and here it is in all its punch-drunk, bottle-smashing punk glory. “Quarter to Four” combines NBT’s punk chops with their groove power to create a solid closer that leaves you sweaty and nearly out of breath as they sing about existential dread: “Close my eyes, I don’t wanna see. Sun’s comin’ up on my history.” Good grief, that’s some gut punch stuff right there. The Diamond Edition ends with “Theme from Nightmare Scenario” – an instrumental garage rock track that would make The Stooges proud.

By the way, all proceeds from the sale of Nightmare Scenario: Diamond Edition go to the Black Queer and Intersectional Collective and Columbus Freedom Fund – two great causes – so it’s a win-win for you and them. Don’t hesitate to snag this.

Keep your mind open.

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Review: Hum – Inlet

Everyone knows that 2020 has been a crappy year, but there have been some pleanst surprises this year: Drive-ins made a spectacular comeback, pets adoptions skyrocketed, Dungeons and Dragons became more popular than it has been since the early 1990s, Crayola released crayons with colors that better reflect all the different skin tones in the world, people saved money, read books, and learned how to cook again.

Also, Hum released a new album – Inlet.

For those of you unaware, Hum are a heavy shoegaze / space rock band who released four albums between 1991 and 1998. Their single, “Stars,” from the 1995 album You’d Prefer an Astronaut, was a mainstay of MTV and modern rock radio at the time. They were one of those bands that everyone found intriguing, but who somewhat disappeared after poor sales of their 1998 album, Downward Is Heavenward, and their touring van getting wrecked in 2000. There were occasional reunion shows now and then, but they were few and far between. Then, Inlet was released on June 23, 2020 and floored everyone.

It quickly proved that Hum hadn’t lost any of their power. Opener “Waves” unleashes a wall of sound in the first thirty seconds as lead singer / rhythm guitarist Matt Talbott (whose voice seems to have not aged a day) sings about the power of nature and drummer Bryan St. Pere sounds like he’s beating his snare drum through the floor. The loud, heavy, yet clear sound bassist Jeff Dimpsey gets on “In the Den” is a thing of wonder. It carries the track while Tablott and lead guitarist Tim Lash unleash electric guitar chugging like two growling tugboats pulling a barge loaded with UFO parts.

Dimpsey’s bass somehow gets heavier on “Desert Rambler” – which is over nine minutes of fuzzy, shimmering space rock. “Where is the bottom? I wouldn’t know,” Talbott sings. This seems to be about depression and heartbreak, but it could also be about whatever’s inside a cosmic wormhole. The song reminds me of alien landscapes drawn by Moebius.

“Step into You” is the shortest song on the album at just over four minutes in length, but it’s no less fuzzy. The lads in Hum have this amazing ability to create a sense of gravity being in flux around you with their sound. It’s difficult to describe, but it almost becomes tactile when you hear it. “The Summoning” ups the buzz-saw guitars so they sound like a swarm of super-intelligent bees.

It seems appropriate that they have a song called “Cloud City” on the album since many of the tracks seem to lift you into the upper atmosphere and beyond. “I don’t feel anything,” Talbott sings, perhaps because he’s weightless by this point from the sheer power of he and the rest of Hum are generating to get to escape velocity.

“I want to stay next to you. I don’t remember your name. Do you feel the tremors here?” Talbott asks on “Folding” – a soaring song about love and knowing when to let go of it when it’s gone. The song melts into a psychedelic whale song-like drone for over a minute at the end. Lash really gets to strut his stuff (as if he hasn’t been throughout the entire record) on the closer, “Shapeshifter,” which has him flying like an eagle over a barren desert one moment and then roaring across that same desert in an experimental rocket car the next.

It’s a stunning record and a welcome return from Hum. It’s a wonderful escape from the chaos of 2020. Put on your headphones, sit in a place where you can watch nature, and let it do the rest.

Keep your mind open.

[I’d hum a happy tune if you subscribed.]

Review: Windhand – Levitation Sessions

It’s difficult to capture the power of Windhand live, but the Reverb Appreciation Society‘s druids did a good job of it with the Virginian doom metal band’s Levitation Sessions.

Garrett Morris‘ opening guitar riffs on “Old Evil” are like the sound of a dragon awakening from a slumber in a dormant volcano. Dorthia Cottrell‘s vocals are the voice of the sorceress awakening said dragon, Ryan Wolfe‘s drums are the sides of the volcano breaking away as the dragon stretches its wings, and Parker Chandler‘s bass is the growling of the beast’s hungry, fiery belly. This heavy and hypnotizing sound is one that Windhand does well, and it’s a chilling experience.

“Diablerie,” a song about the machinations of evil beings, sounds like a swarm of black cloaked hornets. Cottrell’s vocals fade between the front and back of the song, not unlike a mist you see and feel around you but cannot grasp. Morris’ solo is like a falling star you manage to glimpse through a break in the mist before it hits the Earth and creates a shockwave for miles.

There’s a little time to breathe before “First to Die,” and I love the way Cottrell chose to sing the vocals on this version. She takes to a quieter (but not by much, mind you) approach and lets Chandler’s bass and Wolfe’s drums carry the red dwarf star matter-heavy weight of the track. The live version of “Forest Clouds” on this recording gives me chills every time I hear it. Every. Time. It’s like walking in a dark wetlands at the bottom of a cemetery hill filled with cloaked figures who may or may not be ghosts. It creeps along for nearly eleven minutes and can be unsettling to the uninitiated.

“Three Sisters” (with horror movie keyboard riffs from Jonathan Kassalow) layers the reverb on Cottrell’s vocals and Morris’ guitar to make them sound like siren and whale songs bouncing off sharp rocks. Chandler and Wolfe keep the rhythm simple and brooding throughout it, not unlike the Telltale Heart. The opening guitar squall of “Grey Garden” is practically the sound of a wrought iron gate being wrenched open on a tomb, which is appropriate for a song about death and reincarnation.

“I miss the feeling of the landslide, shaking the dust off my skin,” Cottrell sings on “Orchard” – a dark song about even darker things that lie waiting for us beyond the veil (if we choose to give them power, that is). The album ends with another eleven-minute stunner – “Cossack.” There’s enough sludge in it to make you feel like you’re wading through a swamp to battle a shambling mound with an obsidian sword you found in an abandoned dwarfish mine. It slows to the pace of a kaiju monster stomping across the countryside around the eight-minute mark.

It’s another excellent Levitation Session and a fine addition to Windhand‘s catalogue. Not even 2020 can keep their power at bay.

Keep your mind open.

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Review: Khruangin – LateNightTales

When asked to make their own LateNightTales compilation, Khruangbin decided to make it as much a showcase of international talent as possible. The result is a luxurious musical trip around the globe.

Opening track “Illuminations” by Devadip Carlos Santana and Turiya Alice Coltrane is like the opening theme to an exotic romance / adventure film with it’s luscious harp strings, playful violins, and simple piano and guitar chords. “I Know That (When the Spring Time Comes)” by Brilliantes Del Vuelo is robotic dub with thick bass, reverbed hand percussion, and vocals that sound like a Star Wars droid. “Khushi” by Nazia Hassan is Middle Eastern disco with neon synths and a slick hand percussion beat.

Kelly Doyle‘s “DRM” is full of thumping electro-bass and fun, slightly off-kilter beats. The bass gets fatter on Sanullim‘s “Don’t Go” – a track that will go directly onto your disco and / or funk playlists. Maxwell Udoh‘s “I Like It (Don’t Stop)” is more slick disco and David Marez‘s “Enséñame” has big brass horns that Portishead would love to sample and sharp 1970’s Spanish love song vocals.

Gerald Lee‘s “Can You Feel the Love (Reprise)” is pure 1970s bedroom rock with sultry female vocals (“Here we are, sitin’ with one another, so alive and so free…”). Justine and the Victorian Punks have a pillow talk conversation over a sweet groove that would be perfect for strutting your stuff down a runway. George Yanagi and Nadja Band then saunter into the room with a Japanese slow jam that should be on any turntable in the Land of the Rising Sun if you plan on any nocturnal mixers there.

Russian lounge jazz follows that. Khruangbin slide into the mix next with a cover of Kool and the Gang‘s “Summer Madness” that is so smooth that you almost slip on it as it oozes out of your speakers and settles on the floor around you. Paloma San Basilio‘s “Contigo” has playful female vocals backed with R&B bass and wicked high hat work. The horn section on the Roha Band‘s “Yetikimt Abeba” is top-notch, knowing when to move to the front and when to stay out of the way of the vocals and effortless beat. The album ends with a spoken word piece by Tierney Malone and Geoffrey Muller. It’s a love poem that sounds like it’s from space (and, after all, much of the poem is about the speaker chasing after his love who has left the Earth) with simple banjo plucks and space transmission beeps.

It’s a lovely compilation and one that will make you seek out a lot of these artists, as any compilation should do. Hats off to Khruangbin for putting it together for us.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Sam at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Review: Badge Époque Ensemble – Self Help

Maximilian Turnbull, the frontman for Toronto’s Badge Époque Ensemble, describes their new album, Self Help, as “combining jazz-funk and mysticism.” I don’t think I can describe it better than that.

“Sing a Silent Gospel” starts off the album with something like a Steely Dan tune with its great saxophone work by Karen Ng and bright keyboards from Turnbull. “Unity (It’s Up to You)” is a funky jam with neat vocal harmonies backed by Jay Anderson‘s tight drumming any hip hop DJ would envy. “The Sound Where My Head Was” has a neat 1970s sound to it with Turnbull’s keys and Giosuè Rosati‘s putting down a retro groove.

A lovely flute solo starts “Just Space for Light” and then it melts into a beautiful song about embracing love and light – and more great flute solos from Alia O’Brien. “Birds Fly through Ancient Ruins” is almost eleven minutes of psychedelic jazz that is suitable for meditation, yoga, creating any kind of art, or even belly dancing as Chris Bezant plays dusty western guitar and Ed Squires‘ hand percussion lulls you into a trance. Ng’s sax solo is like something you’d hear in the distance while you find yourself trapped in a film noir.

Turnbull’s smooth piano carries us through the closer, “Extinct Commune,” with hopeful chords to uplift you and give you some of that self-help mentioned in the album’s title.

Self Help is indeed a good title for this album, as that jazz-funk / mysticism combination does you well. It helps you shake cobwebs out of your head and refocus. We all need that this year.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Jessica at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Review: King Hannah – Tell Me Your Mind and I’ll Tell You Mine

Tell Me Your Mind and I’ll Tell You Mine is an EP by King Hannah that I wasn’t sure about at first. It didn’t immediately grab me, but I could feel something there I couldn’t quite describe. Was it a batch of dream pop hooks? Vocal craft from a synthwave torch singer lounge? I’m still not sure after listening to the EP multiple times, but I’m sure that it gets into your body and settles there like a warm cat on your chest that now and then likes to nibble on your fingers.

The EP opens with the lush, somewhat dark “And Then Out of Nowhere, It Rained.” Hannah Merrick‘s voice is like a ghost drifting toward you across an English moor and the synths and acoustic guitar riffs are like a fog that’s gone just as you notice it, blending into “Meal Deal” – which has a bit of an Americana / western sound to it with its mix of steel guitar and electro-drone.

I don’t know who “Bill Tench” is, but Merrick says, “I think you’re cooler than most,” at the beginning of the track, so he must be at least an interesting fellow. The song has a great bass groove and shoegaze guitars throughout it. “I need you so bad,” Merrick sings on “Crème Brûlée” – a haunting, sexy track in which she also admits, “I think I like you too much.” David Lynch could drop this into the soundtrack of his next film and no one would bat an eye.

“The Sea Has Stretch Marks” is easily one of the most intriguing titles I’ve heard all year, and the song rolls along like slow waves on a pebble stone beach. The album ends with “Reprise (Moving Day).” It’s an intriguing track full of shoegaze bliss, heavy bass, strange samples about (I think) Greek gods, and stuff you’d hear strolling the streets of San Futuro, California before it metamorphoses into quiet dream pop.

King Hannah tells us their mind throughout this EP, but we’re left wondering many things. It provides more questions than answers, which makes us eager to hear more from them – as any good EP should.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Kate at Stereo Sanctity.]

Review: Holy Wave – Interloper

Austin dream-psych rockers Holy Wave‘s new album, Interloper, is a great blend of surf drones, shoegaze touches, and mind-trip riffs. The weird album cover art sums up the sound of the album fairly well – abstract to a degree, expanding and shrinking at the same time, and full of riddles.

Opening with a song called “Schmetterling” (German for “Butterfly”) is a good choice for the record, as the song spreads its silky wings and flutters out of your speakers with a happy, warm, Zen groove (“The sound of destruction sounds just like creation.”). “R&B” sings R&B lyrics (“I knew I wanted to be with you when you kissed me, and now these lips are just for you. I only have eyes for you.”) over psychedelic guitar chords and synthwave keyboards.

The Beatles-influenced title track is an ode (or possibly a lament) to the different worlds of touring the world and hanging out at home. The prominent synth work on it is quite good. “Maybe Then I Can Cry” is great psychedelia and a song about lost loves and holding onto memories. “Escapism” has the band hushing us as the psychedelic butterfly wings warm in the Texas sun and then take flight across an herb garden in some lovely hippie woman’s backyard.

However, on the next track they declare “I’m Not Living in the Past Anymore.” It’s a hot synth-rock track and a highlight of the record with the band pleading for us (and themselves) to stay in the present and embrace all there is, was, and will be. “No Love” is a dreamy track, not unlike a Slowdive tune (who are known influences on the band) with its vocals and instruments sounding like that butterfly now gliding along a lazy river that flows near a club playing a mix of acid jazz and psych-rock.

The title of “Hell Bastards” sounds like it’s going to be the theme song to an obscure European WWII movie from the 1960’s, but it’s actually a cool krautrock song. The beats of “Buddhist Pete” (the longest track on the record) get into your shoulders and make you move. The closing track, “Redhead,” drifts into your ears, settles in your brain, and stays there like a butterfly perched on your arm.

An interloper is someone who becomes involved in a place or situation where they’re not wanted or don’t belong. It’s easy to feel like that, especially in 2020, and even in a “normal” year if you’re in a touring band. Holy Wave probably felt like interlopers scores of times while touring, and Interloper is a great narrative of them being out of place at home and abroad.

Keep your mind open.

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Rewind Review: Oh Sees – Mutilator Defeated at Last (2015)

I have no idea if that weird, prickly pear-headed humanoid holding what appears to be either a cruller or a tower of onion rings is the “Mutilator” mentioned in the title of Thee Oh Sees‘ 2015 album Mutilator Defeated at Last or the created that is about to defeated Mutilator on some sort of rope bridge or walkway with a slime-covered railing. I do know, however, that it rocks beginning to end and has some of their biggest hits.

The loopy bass of Tim Hellman (his first album with the band) gets things off to a great start on “Web” – the sticky, funky opener that includes wild drumming from Nick Murray (also his first foray with the band) and John Dwyer‘s usual guitar work that shifts from frenetic to psychedelic as fast as Barry Allen turning a corner. “Withered Hand” starts out with the sounds of wind rattling through a haunted house and Murray’s snare drum sounding like a hissing adder before Dwyer unloads his guitar riffs like a cauldron of hot oil shot from a trebuchet.

“Poor Queen” is one of Oh Sees‘ / O Sees‘ / OCS‘ tunes that’s almost a shoegaze track. Dwyer’s vocals have just enough reverb and the guitar and synths blend together like incense and tea. “Turned Out Light” has a great garage rock swing to it that is pure fun to hear and probably to play for Dwyer and his crew.

“Lupine Ossuary” is a wild ride that comes at you from so many angles that it’s like being in the middle of a mosh pit that has a live hornet’s nest being kicked around on the floor, but the hornets are as drunk, high, or geared up as everyone else. “Sticky Hulks” is almost seven minutes of psychedelia with Dwyer’s guitar sometimes sounding like sonar pings and his electric organ work sounding like church music. “Holy Smoke” is (Dare I say it?) a pretty song. Dwyer’s acoustic guitar picking and strumming mixes well with Murray’s simple beats, Hellman’s bass line walk, and Dwyer’s complimentary synths.

“Rogue Planet” rolls and tumbles like its namesake charging through space toward its destructive meeting with another celestial body. The closer, “Palace Doctor,” sends us out on a psychedelic note with Murray’s drums slinking in the background with Dwyer’s vocals as the guitar and bass come forward like inquisitive ghosts.

Perhaps Mutilator was defeated by this album and we all need to thank Thee Oh Sees for saving us from an extra-dimensional threat by the power of their rock. I wouldn’t be surprised if that were the case. Their stuff can shake walls and reality, and this album certainly proves this true.

Keep your mind open.

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Rewind Review: King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard – Float Along – Fill Your Lungs (2013)

It’s a bit difficult to believe that King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard‘s Float Along – Fill Your Lungs is seven years old as I write this because it sounds like they could’ve released it yesterday. It mixes psychedelia with bluesy grooves and does so without effort.

They’re also one of the few bands out there who would dare to make the opening track on an album almost sixteen minutes long, and one of the few who can pull off such a feat. That song is “Head On / Pill.” Lead singer Stuart Mackenzie‘s vocals are trippier than a lava lamp and the addition of panning sitar is outstanding. The song builds into a wild jam with vocal chants and guitar chords that swirl like a dust devil working its way up to becoming a full-blown dust storm.

“I Am Not a Man Unless I Have a Woman” is layered with a lot of cool reverb and echoed vocal effects to keep the mind melt going. “God Is Calling Me Back Home” puts acoustic guitars in the front and makes the vocals sound like they’re coming out of an old radio before it turns into a wild freakout.

“30 Past 7” brings back the sitar and it blends well with guitar riffs that sound like eagle calls echoing over an Australian desert. “Let Me Mend the Past” is a favorite at their live shows as Ambrose Kenny Smith takes over lead vocals with a passioned plea for an angry lover to forgive him. The sweaty, gritty guitars and beats and somewhat goth lyrics (i.e., “I hope I don’t wake up.”) of “Mystery Jack” are the kinds of things Anton Newcombe dreams about while strolling to a German coffee house and taking a drag on a clove cigarette. Smith sings lead on “Pop in My Step,” which is a poppy and snappy as you hope it will be. The title track ends the record on a meditative, trippy note.

It’s one of their best records, really. It blends psychedelic rock, blues, microtonal bits, and Eastern Indian music into a heady brew that leaves you feeling pretty cool after you’ve consumed it.

Keep your mind open.

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