During the course of 2009, I became a huge fan of Frightened Rabbit; so much so that I named their excellent second album The Midnight Organ Fight my top "Found Sound" album of 2009. Their mix of dense, layered instrumentation and complementary/contradictory vocal melodies sit just right with me. Each song had its own merit - be it some insightful lyrics, a killer guitar riff, or a perfect marriage of melody - and should stand the test of time. I was hoping for the same from The Winter of Mixed Drinks, and in some ways I have. Unfortunately, in many ways it also fails to live up to its own hype.
Let me break it down for you: there are four outstanding tracks on this new album, and the rest are skippable. First standout track is the single "Swim Until You Can't See Land", which showcases a slower, poppier side to the band without compromising on their trademark cynicism. Its chorus line is so catchy that they repeated it on track seven. Next up is track three, "The Loneliness and the Scream", which starts out somewhat muddled but hits its stride about two and a half minutes in, with the best vocal counter-chorus on the record. "Nothing Like You" is the next keeper, which is probably the most readio-ready single on the album, with a chugging mid-tempo pace and ultra-catchy verses. Finally, track five, "Skip the Youth", has a sufficiently long buildup and vocal intro, but does run a little bit stale in its six-plus-minute runtime. Closer "Yes, I Would" is remarkable for its unique falsetto vocals, but it just doesn't quite hit home as well as the four tracks mentioned above.
The rest of the album is decent, but it simply doesn't hold a candle to their previous effort. That's not to say this is a bad album; when a band follows up the album of their career with a serviceable album, that's a win in my book.
Everybody Was In the French Resistance…Now! is a band name that I can tolerate saying aloud every once in a while. Like, once a year. It's funny, because this album is something that I could probably only tolerate listening to about once a year, too. The band (no, I'm not repeating the name, thankyouverymuch) features two people - Eddie Argos (lead singer of Art Brut) and a girl from a band I've never heard of, Blood Arm. The songs themselves are "answer songs" - blatant responses to other songs and pop culture events - and were popular in the 1950s and 1960s. As someone who wasn't alive then (come on, I'm old, but not that old), I just don't see the point. I'm all for cultural reference, but when the content of your product is the response to other product, I'm grasping to find a reason for this band to exist.
The songs themselves are sweet, bubblegum pop ditties, usually the product of just a couple melodic ideas done to death. What's funny is that this is the exact replica of what Argos' day-job band Art Brut does, but they do it to stunning effect. Art Brut has an insightful bite to it, thanks to its crunchy guitars and laissez-faire approach to song construction. It's a bite that's ultimately harmless, but fun to experience. By contrast, this record is like being licked by a dirty, lazy dog.
I was driven to get this album by sheer curiosity, but eventually repulsed by its shallowness and inanity. If you're a fan of Art Brut, wait for the next Art Brut album.
White Marks on a White Wall is the second album by criminally-unsigned indie rock band Linus. I've had the pleasure of following them during their entire 10+ years of existence, and it's been a wild ride. Their debut album, The Construction, was released in 2005 and featured two distinctive elements: an undeniable potential, and poor production that never gave these exciting songs justice. The Construction showed a young band that had the makings of the next Weezer, while hinting at a depth that Weezer only dreamed about reaching. It was full of catchy vocal melodies that were complemented by bright, colorful bass trimmings and and emerging guitar prowess. Lead single, "Arrivals and Departures", was features on Dance Dance Revolution Universe 2 on the Xbox 360, which was ridiculously cool.
Despite its double-reference to something brighter, I had first considered White Marks on a White Wall a dark spot on their decade of music making. Linus set out to record these songs even before The Construction released, and it took five years for them to finally surface. The delay is the result of near-obsessive recording sessions, lineup changes, periods of inactivity and some navel-gazing introspection. I feared that by the time this album finally hit the streets, it would have lost its relevancy; I'm happy to say that in the end, this is a complicated and conflicting record that simply isn't showing any signs of age.
Upon initial listen, the individual tracks don't stand out as much as the classics on their first album, but I'm floored by what they did with them. White Marks on a White Wall features top-notch production taste and a perfect mix. Singer/guitarist Dave Neely's guitar chops have exploded, while showing a restraint that keeps each track from meandering. Gone are the pop leanings of Weezer (other than on track nine, "SoSo"), and instead we see a band that's grown exponentially in other directions; they've taken onboard the dance-stylings of bands like Franz Ferdinand and Hot Hot Heat but on their own terms, ratcheting the intensity back a hair and adding a jazz influence a la The Sea and the Cake or The Whitest Boy Alive. The end product is an album that's wholly listenable in several settings.
There are a couple tracks that are worth skipping, but all in all I'm enjoying this album much more than I expected to be. What's even better is that their most recent songs take their sound even further; if they can get those out soon, they'll have the world at their feet.
I was just sent this song from Jason Lytle himself, singer of the now-defunct band Grandaddy. We're not buddies or anything, I'm just subscribed to his newsletter. The video you see above is an ultra-rare Grandaddy song called "Wonder Why In LA", and it's great.
After a bit of research and some help from the gracious folks at Bloguin, we're now able to embed Flash-based SWF files in our posts. If that last sentence sounded like garbage to you, let me put it more simply: we can now add streaming songs from lala.com into our record reviews. Don't believe me? Check this shit out:
Lala.com is awesome, and I wrote about it once on our old site. It doesn't have every song in the universe though, so I may use Grooveshark.com from time to time, as well:
FACT ONE: I'm a geographically-minded man. Where a band comes from is very important to me.
FACT TWO: I tend to not like bands from Florida. Don't know why, but it does have something to do with the fact that some bands I really hate are from there. Two words sum this up nicely: Limp Bizkit.
Aside from some random hardcore albums from ten years ago, Surfer Blood's Astro Coast may be my favorite Florida-based album. It's a genuine mix of great bands and styles; I can hear a reverb-drenched version of Weezer's blue album occasionally, a bit of Built to Spill (minus the insane guitar skills), and even a touch of Pavement from time to time. Altogether, we're looking at an A-list of comparables that doesn't usually happen with a debut album. Along those same lines, there's a youthful vigor to this album as well; the easiest example is track four, "Harmonix", whose main guitar riff is based on, you guessed it, guitar harmonics. This naivete actually makes this album more interesting and fun.
This is a record that I'll be processing all year long. It's full of sing-a-longs and intricate layering, and picking each section apart is going to be a lot of fun. Definitely look this album up.
The Soft Pack is a new indie band from San Diego. They've only been around for a year or two, and they used to be called The Muslims but people got pissed. Their music is run-of-the-mill pop rock with some definite indie stylings. In fact, many of their songs run the gamut of most guitar-based rock music from the past twenty years; opener "C'mon" sounds like it fits with the vintage 60s garage rock revivalists of the early 2000s, while track six "More or Less" sounds like early R.E.M., but maybe a little poppier. Either way, there's a whole lot of swagger to be found in these tight 30 minutes, and it's an album best suited for summer days.
There's nothing life-changing about this band, but there's still something here that keeps these guys from drowning in obscurity - each song is well-crafted and still sounds fresh despite its tried and true foundation. Being that it's damn cold outside all the time, I've had a hard time swallowing their summer-fun jangle lately. As it stands, I plan on pulling this CD out in a few months when things start warming up outside, and I'm sure I'll have warmed up to these guys even more by then.
I may not say this often enough, but I'm a big fan of Rogue Wave. There's a Shins-esque vitality to them that just keeps me coming back for more. I've always considered band leader Zach Schwartz (who goes by Zach Rogue, even though no one else in the band uses that last name, bless his little heart) to be an unspoken genius of the indie music world; he's taken songs that could be slightly mediocre, and adds just the right twinge of style and inventiveness to keep it afloat. It's an inspiring gift that has waned as of late.
Permalight is the fourth album by Rogue Wave, and if you ask me, it's their second bad album. 2007's Asleep At Heaven's Gate suffered from about 15% too much reverb, while lacking about 64% of the inventive melodies the band had touted during their first two records. The end result was a meandering and useless statement that wasn't pop, wasn't rock, and wasn't very good. I'm happy to say that Permalight isn't lacking in catchy melodies. Instead, it suffers from a lack of focus, or rather, the wrong focus. These are songs that sound like they're trying to appeal to an OC-watching crowd; problem is, The OC was cancelled years ago. These pop songs have sacrificed quality for accessibility, and it leaves me with a shallow taste in my mouth. In fact, b-sides from the first two Rogue Wave albums fare better than Permalight - if you were a fan of the first two albums by this band, you'd be better off spending your time looking up those old b-sides than listening to this album.
Harlem's Hippies is my first "favorite record" of the year. Harlem is a three-peice garage rock band from Austin, and this is their second album. Its 16 tracks finish in a little over 40 minutes, and it's an exhausting experience. Although the songs are only a minute or two long each, I have a hard time taking in more than half of them at once. As it stands, I've been cutting it up into halves just so I don't go crazy.
The issue is that each song is so potent, so full of energy and vigor, that it's draining. But trust me, this is a good thing. From the outset of track one, "Someday Soon", you know you're onto something big here; this opener has at least six subtle melodies that are hidden inside a back-to-the-basics rock and roll track. The album culminates early, in track six, "Gay Human Bones", which has my favorite chorus of 2010. This is an album created by kids that grew up listening to Nirvana, who then decided to be the next Beatles, without forgetting where they came from.
I'll be the first to admit that there isn't a ton of variety in this album, but that's what I find so engrossing. I love it when a band takes one sound, one style, and fills an album full of intricacies within these parameters. It's how The Strokes' debut clicked so well, and it's the reason why I'll be listening to Hippies all year long.
Romance is Boring, the third album from Welsh-but-not-Welsh (the band members are all from Wales, but none are Welsh - these things are very important to me) band Los Campesinos! is the first album of theirs that I've actually given a fighting chance. I've had a hard time getting into their first two albums; the abrasiveness of their synth-heavy pop punk sound was a little too irritating for me on initial listen. And honestly, if it wasn't for the sheer awesomeness of this album's first track, "In Media Res", I may have skipped this one too. In the end, I'm glad I didn't because this is a fun and rewarding album full of peaks and valleys that eventually even out to one solid listen.
This band has a few predictable elements - all the last names of their band members is "Campesinos!", and that damned exclamation point - but their music is anything but predictable. It can run from a quiet buildup as seen in the opening track, to some really big moments (thank the fact that they have seven people in this band). The album sports a lot of girl/guy vocals, and a remarkable number of shouts, while still keeping this album much more palatable than one would expect. In short, if you're looking for something that's challenging and aggressive, while still deep enough to warrant multiple listens, and you don't mind that they used a foreign word for their band despite the fact that none of them can probably speak Spanish, and you're okay with being a little overloaded with an occasionally abrasive synth, this album's for you.
Disagree with us? Got an idea? Want to put up your own post with full credit?
Click here to send it to us and we'll post it...as long as it doesn't suck.
About Bloguin
Bloguin is the revolutionary blog network specifically focused on helping bloggers get the most out of their websites. We're currently working on building a large network of online communities and hope to expand our blogging coverage to include a wide range of topics.
Advertisers
The Bloguin Network allows advertisers to promote their products and services to our ever-growing number of visitors. We offer both site-specific ad placements as well as the ability to run a network-wide campaign. If you're interested in working with Bloguin to meet your advertising needs, please contact us.
Bloggers Wanted
The Bloguin Network is always looking to expand. We're specifically looking for blogs in the sports, entertainment, and video games field, but are open to adding any type of quality site. If you're a blogger and interested in joining our network, please fill out our application form.
The Bloguin Login
The Bloguin Login gives you full access to everything our network has to offer. Your name and password will work for each and every one of our sites. Signing up is simple, and will allow you to post in all our forums, create member blogs, and access other cool features! What are you waiting for? Create an Account!
Bloguin is the revolutionary blog network specifically focused on helping bloggers get the most out of their websites. We're currently working on building a large network of online communities and hope to expand our blogging coverage to include a wide range of topics. 
The Bloguin Network allows advertisers to promote their products and services to our ever-growing number of visitors. We offer both site-specific ad placements as well as the ability to run a network-wide campaign. If you're interested in working with Bloguin to meet your advertising needs, please contact us.
The Bloguin Network is always looking to expand. We're specifically looking for blogs in the sports, entertainment, and video games field, but are open to adding any type of quality site. If you're a blogger and interested in joining our network, please fill out our application form.
The Bloguin Login gives you full access to everything our network has to offer. Your name and password will work for each and every one of our sites. Signing up is simple, and will allow you to post in all our forums, create member blogs, and access other cool features! What are you waiting for? Create an Account!