Music

Records

Music Reviews - The Writing-Cute-Things-On-The-Spine-Of-This-Magazine-Every-Issue-Is-Starting-To-Feel-Like-A-Lame-Gimmick Issue


  
 
 
     
 
 
     




 

C-RAYZ WALZ
Who the F%@k Are You?
Kings Link
It’s just like the white man to call a brother on Martin Luther King Day and ask him to do some work. Especially some work that isn’t even my job. I don’t review rap. Why call me? Because I’m black? That’s fucked up. Straight-up racist. Just because white people helped us get Obama into office does not mean black folks suddenly like white people. We don’t. So don’t start raising your fist in the air to me like we’re homies and don’t think just because I’m your one black friend you can ask me to review rap CDs. What else would you like me to write about? Tiger Woods? Michael Jordan? Watermelons? Fuck off.

CHRIS NIERATKO
 

BEASTIE BOYS
Paul’s Boutique 20th Anniversary Edition
Capitol
You’re kidding, right? You’re going to call my house on Black Christmas and have the balls to ask me to review some white rap? And not just “some white rap”—the last album that was allowed to sample whatever they wanted for free and fucked it up for black rappers forever. You have some balls, Vice. I don’t care if you have a brown dude as your boss. He’s not even the good kind of brown. He’s that bad-news-brown that likes to blow shit up. Racists, man, racists. I’ll have your reviews Thursday. If you’re lucky. Fuck off.

CHRIS NIERATKO

 

BROTHER ALI
The Truth Is Here
Rhymesayers Entertainment
And tomorrow Obama is getting initiated so I’m not doing any work then either. I just might have to call out sick on Wednesday too. So I don’t know when you’re going to see your reviews. Fuck off.

CHRIS NIERATKO
 

NINJASONIK
Art School Girls
Chief
This album sounds like it bottled up a house party near Pratt before they took Sparks off the market. It might be because they remixed and Midas-touched half the good indie bands in Brooklyn, but who cares, it’s just good vibes and goofy super-drunk smiles and way too much fun. Side note, I listened to this album 15 times in a row, and by the end of it, after memorizing the skits to the point where mouthing the words came easy, I not only felt like I had black friends, I felt like I might BE someone’s black friend.

GG ALBERT
   

THESE ARE POWERS
All Aboard Future
Dead Oceans
I don’t trust band names that are declarative sentences with pronouns. These Arms Are Snakes, This Is a Process of a Still Life, This Will Destroy You, etc. What will destroy me? I hope you’re referring to your dick, because only then is this a good name. In fact, This Dick Will Destroy You is a great band name. Anyway, this album is pretty interesting, with neat polyrhythmic beats (thanks Wikipedia!) and cool noises that sometimes sound like a weird, fun dance party and sometimes sound like dark industrial techno they play in S&M clubs (I’m only guessing).

CHRISTIAN “DICK JOKE” STORM
 

THE BRAN FLAKES
I Have Hands
Illegal Art
Even if sampling the Muppets is your whole shtick and you’ve been doing it since the 90s, describing anything you do past the age of 20 as “sugar-induced” still sends visions of Chris Hansen walking through my head. Anyways, this is pretty much what Girl Talk would sound like if he picked songs nobody liked.

SANTO JABBIE

REVOLTING COCKS
Sex-O Olympic-O
13th Planet
The only difference between this and 2006’s Cocked and Loaded is the absence of bizarre guests (half of Cheap Trick and ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons) and usual suspects (Gibby Haynes and Jello), leaving Al to, as it says on the band’s site, “pass the torch” (translated: “surround myself with hacks”) to three dudes who rock a similar and wildly unfortunate snakeskin-hat/cowboy-biker dirtbag look. Unsurprisingly, Sex-O trades in the poorly aged “industrial dance-metal” this band made 20 years ago—a sound that we pray to our lord Satan will remain free of nostalgic revival.

ANDREW EARLES
 

20,000
S/T
Self-released
God, I hate that cadence all these synthy bands sing in. You know what I’m talking about? “NEH neh neh neh, neh NEH neh NEH NEH,” etc. Just use a vocoder or something already. Christ.

GRANVILLE CARNOHAN


 
   
     

CANNIBAL CORPSE
Evisceration Plague
Metal Blade
Getting your grindcore from a 40-year-old Buffalo native is like getting a root canal from a Moroccan housecat. Funny in theory, but PREPOSTEROUS in practice.

ETHAN SNAPCRACKLEPOP
 

ALL NIGHT DRUG PROWLING WOLVES
S/T
Colonel
Generally when a band is fixated on things like drinking and Tom Waits, the results involve a bunch of old-timey words and a lot less actual drinking than advertised. Very rarely does it end up sounding like some secret tape of Joe Strummer and later Hüsker Dü getting wasted together and belting out the choruses of Cars songs. If things go as planned, I will never know what this album sounds like 100 percent sober.

TERRY HAND
 

...AND YOU WILL KNOW US BY THE TRAIL OF THE DEAD
The Century of Self
Richter Scale
Whenever a band is notorious for a destructive stage show—smashing guitars, lighting shit on fire, etc.—you have to wonder whether they’re really gripped by passion and lost in the moment or just some theatrical homos who held a preshow meeting in the green room to choreograph the chaos. A few years later, if that band writes a record that sounds like an Elton John tribute, you don’t have to wonder anymore.

MIKE TOMLIN
 

LISSY TRULLIE
Self-Taught Learner
American Myth
When we first saw this lezzie fashion plate perform live a few years ago, she used to go for a mellow Cat Power vibe. Somewhere along the way she decided to “rock out,” as the kids say, and now she oscillates between sounding like a 14-year-old boy trying to sing like Morrissey and a 14-year-old boy trying to sing like Chrissie Hynde—both of which produce surprisingly endearing aural results. Lissy’s currently on tour with the Virgins, which is actually quite troubling because that means they’ve taken about 85 percent of New York City’s “cool” reserves on the road with them and have thus left the city wide open for nerd attacks. Way to go, guys.

MEG SNEED
 

PROPAGANDHI
Supporting Caste
Smallman
“Clever” titles, “melodic” singing, and totally restrained pop metal come together to form a boring record full of the kind of songs that you hear in a movie theater before the previews. This band treats punk like a shitty job where its members are dragging themselves to the job site and counting the minutes until they get to go home and drink and eat their Hungry Man dinners while furiously beating their wives.

RICK CRAZIN
 

FAKE PROBLEMS
It’s Great to Be Alive
SideOneDummy
When I was growing up, it seemed like Jersey was the undisputed mecca for enviable basement shows: You had the Souls for kids with patches and bikes, Mouthpiece for those with camo shorts and Hondas, and Lifetime for all. Nowadays, it certainly seems like Florida has taken the crown, and Fake Problems is the latest to strengthen their hold. Good for Floridians. This is important stuff.

RAY RICE

RUMPELSTILTSKIN GRINDER
Living for Death, Destroying the Rest
Relapse
Using a spokescreature/mascot is a metal tradition, and Rumpelstiltskin Grinder takes it to ridiculous extremes. Devolving the fairy-tale character in the band’s name into a one-eyed killing machine? Sure, sounds like a solid plan—perhaps the threat of being “grinded” has set old Rumpels off on a murderous rampage. Whatever the story, these guys have written the Slayer album that Slayer will never write, regardless of Slayer’s current “back-to-their-golden-days” hoodwinking campaign. And kudos for an album cover that’ll make your girlfriend insult you to her friends.

ANDREW EARLES
 

THE COATHANGERS
Scramble
Suicide Squeeze
I didn’t think they could top “Don’t Touch My Shit,” but here we are: A song whose chorus is the sound that woman made when she fell out of the grape-stomping pan on YouTube. Well played, ladies.

ROLF NABORG
 

GUN OUTFIT
Dim Light
PPM
It’s about time we started revisiting things worth visiting in the first place. This is stripped-down punk rock done right, meaning it’s catchy, quick, and fuzzy and it nods on more than one occasion to Hüsker Dü. And I miss Hüsker Dü. Nu-rave? Who missed Altern-8?

ED REED
 

KITTENS ABLAZE
The Monstrous Vanguard
Self-released
Kittens ablaze… with tunefulness! This is one of those fun local bands with a million weird members: a journalist who test-drives power yachts and roller coasters, an ex–fashion buyer, an SAT tutor, a neuroscience PhD, an art handler, and so on and so forth. They use all those bonus instruments, like cello and violin, that make them sound all grand and orchestral even when they’re playing in the basement of Lit. And lead-singer drummers are always fun—it’s like watching a clown balance a chair on his chin while Hula-hooping. I can barely tie my shoes while breathing without getting gum everywhere so, wow, color me impressed!

MOLLY MERKIN

MORRISSEY
Years of Refusal
Polydor/Decca

 

 
Hi. I am going to review this record without ever listening to it. Ready? Here we go: I am way beyond sick of Morrissey. Maybe it’s his older fans who finally ruined him for me, with all their bloated, gasbag, internet-fan-forum-trolling sycophantic bullshit. Or maybe it’s his fake fans who made me hate him—the 22-year-old kids wearing t-shirts that have lyrics of songs they didn’t even know six months ago. Or wait, maybe it’s Moz himself? Maybe it’s the fact that he hasn’t put out a record that was great start to finish since Bona Drag? Don’t start crying about Your Arsenal or whichever of his albums you think you’re special for knowing so well, either. Most of his records have, you know, a couple of good songs. The last one sucked balls all the way. I bet this one does too. Alls I know is that to deserve the level of worship he gets, he should be doing a lot more than shitting out hunks of mediocrity and riding the wave of his ancient work. If everyone wasn’t so busy shrieking about how much they love him just to grab some weird version of street cred, maybe the smoke would clear and we could realize he’s been a hack for over a decade now. I’m just sayin’, is all. PS: Did he BeDazzle a baby?

PICKLES THE ORANGE CAT


 
 
   

MIKE BONES
A Fool for Everyone
The Social Registry
If anybody’s got a problem with us calling Mike Bones this generation’s Harry Nilsson, Leonard Cohen, and J.J. Cale all rolled into one, they can take it up with our Complaints Department at 1-800-EAT-SHIT. And you know, it’s funny—we’ve written about Mikey so many times now that it’s almost as if we have some sort of massive secret crush on him! Which would be ridiculous, right?! [sigh]

JIM JAM
 

ANTONY AND THE JOHNSONS
The Crying Light
Secretly Canadian
If you’d never heard Antony before, I could imagine you might be all, “Who is this lady with the sinus cold and why is she so frightened?” But you would soon grow to love this cuddly, melodramatic tranny as much we do. We didn’t really wanna pull this card, but, well… If you don’t like Antony, you are a raging homophobe. AND a transphobe. You should be ashamed of yourself, you heteronormative jerkface.

LENNY HONK


 

SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE
RTZ
Drag City

REBECCA SCHIFFMAN
To Be Good for a Day
Self-released
I loved this album from the second Rebecca started singing. She has such a deadpan yet sincere voice, like a less goofy Kimya Dawson or a more goofy Suzanne Vega. Plus she has a lisp for a lil’ touch of cuteness. Her lyrics are great too—there’s a song that references the Rabbit vibrator, Wellbutrin, Adderall, and Law & Order all within one minute, but not even in a jokey way, more just like matter-of-fact. So then I googled her and found this insane article some lechy guy wrote about her in the New York Observer last year that chronicles the minutest details of her personal life for no apparent reason. Now I feel like an internet stalker. Her story’s pretty great though—she’s like a long-lost character from The Royal Tenenbaums. Someone should make a movie about her. Oh, and fun fact: Rebecca’s butt was once on the cover of Vice!

KELLY AMNER
 

VETIVER
Tight Knit
Sub Pop
Well, well, well, if it ain’t old Vetiver. Come back here for another word-lickin’, I take it? Well, let’s just see what Old Zeke can find in his opinion barrel… All right, I think I got one. How ’bout this? “This is the musical equivalent of undergoing a really boring colonoscopy.” There we go, now take your janky ass back to San Francisco or wherever you’re from this week.

OLD ZEKE
 
This is a collection of old and rare tracks, and it appears that Chasny used to write the same weird, droning, sometimes dark, sometimes pretty, guitar-driven folk songs he does now, only back then they were even longer (if you can imagine such a thing). I woke up hungover, checked my email, saw that I got this album, put it on, and immediately got back in bed and took a nap. This album was a really good soundtrack for said nap. It made me dream that I had a long beard and was in the Manson Family, but in the happy times before all that tacky murder business.

CHRISTIAN STORM


 		    
   
 

LILY ALLEN
It’s Not Me, It’s You
Capitol
I’m sure I might feel a bit differently about this if I lived in England and she was a little more in my face, but as it stands I really like Lily Allen. The songs are catchy and the antics are adorable. Oh, you’re gonna put Katy Perry’s phone number on the internet? That’s the Buddyhead playbook from ’01! Adorable! That said, I understand that she’s basically a cuter, younger version of Pink with equally awful taste in men, and I’m fully prepared to hate her if she moves to New York.

SANTONIO HOLMES
 

TERP 2 IT
My Wiener Touches the Ceiling
Self-released
You know what? I’m not doing this. I’m not taking this CD home and running the risk of leaving it next to my stereo and then a friend comes over and I have to explain how there’s some nerd in Texas who decided to send us his album to review. That’s probably the most minor of all irritations, but it is still not worth it. End of story.

COLTON DECHAMPLAIN
 

ANIMAL COLLECTIVE
Merriweather Post Pavilion
Domino
And with their umpteenth album, I continue to be baffled by this band’s popularity. I mean, really, this stuff sounds like a sped-up Enya record played over a slowed-down shitty Beach Boys cover band. Personally I like it, but I’m an elderly lady so it makes sense for me to like emotional New Age music with pretty tinkles. But what’s up with indie-rock frat boys loving this shit? Shouldn’t they be listening to, I dunno, Weezer or something you can play on Guitar Hero? I’m not even being sarcastic—I really wanna know.

MRS. DOODLEBUG

IUD
The Proper Sex
The Social Registry
Fact: Lizzi and Sadie are single-handedly keeping the legacy of weirdo NYC downtown art-noise music alive—and if I may say so, looking pretty dang good while doing it. This is a lot darker than the stuff Lizzi does with Gang Gang Dance (the other band single-handedly keeping NYC art-noise alive—what, there can’t be two single hands?). This album reminds me of early Butthole Surfers freak-out jams, like “Lou Reed” or that one with the sheep noises on Locust Abortion Technician. This is exactly the kind of stuff that people always mock when they try to make fun of how “pretentious” New York is. To which we say, hell yeah! This is how we roll. Welcome to New York—now get the fuck out.

MEG SNEED
 
 
3 years ago More from this issue

Comments