Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin
Tape Club
Polyvinyl Records
Street: 10.18
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin = Fruit Bats + early Yo La Tengo + grownup Morning Benders + if The Strokes were acoustic
Okay, 26 tracks is a lot, even considering Tape Club was narrowed from 100 of Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin’s previously unreleased and/or hard-to-find tracks. Despite the length, there is something endearing about these dudes and their Shins-esqe acoustic guitar and harmonic folk voices that remind me of the songs pubescent high school musicians write for their puppy-love girlfriends. I can’t say I was thoroughly engaged for the entirety of Tape Club, with its sound being more sweet and easy than striking. ‘’Lower The Gas Prices, Howard Johnson’’ implements an intriguing drum beat, with lyrics that made me crinkle my nose up in an ‘’aw shucks’’ manner.  ‘’Bigger Than Yr Yard’’ remained in my head for a few hours after listening—perhaps the pop sound and addition of girl backup singer was enough to make it stick. I dub Tape Club an above-average, well-put-together acoustic album. Although not something I would play on repeat, it’s worth at least one good listen if you can spare 26 tracks-worth of your time. (Urban: 12.01) –Kia McGinnis            

Speedwolf
Ride With Death
Hell’s Headbangers
Street: 11.22
Speedwolf = Inepsy + Razor + Agent Steel
If your favorite NWOBHM bands were forcibly coerced into an apocalyptic biker rally to the center of oblivion, Ride With Death—all fleeting punk blasts of barely decipherable gravel-gurgling, clattering drums and razor-wire riffin’ all cobbled together like some sordid leather-jacketed, bullet-belted orgy from a Lemmy Kilmister coloring book—would be playing. It’s well-trodden (motörbiked?) territory for sure, but copped with such grease, grit and nihilistic precision and driven by such steady and undulating messiness (“I am the Demon?” Woah!), you’ll forgive ’em for abusing that corny “wolf” moniker. Imagine Zeke, playing Metallica’s “Hit the Lights” (No Life ‘Til Leather version) over and over, except their instruments are melting and they’re high on trucker speed, and a mushroom cloud just choked out the nuclear desert sky and your skin’s bubbling right off the bone cuz Rob Halford tossed your corpse into a pile of burning Metal Massacre LPs. Imagine that. –Dylan Chadwick

Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks
Mirror Traffic
Matador Records
Street: 08.23
Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks = Pavement + Sonic Youth + King Missile
My first exposure to Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks was back in 2003 when they opened up for Radiohead. Obviously, I was way more stoked for Radiohead that night than the singer dude from Pavement and his new band. Now as the years have passed and I have gotten more and more into the Jicks, I really regret not paying more attention to their set that night. The band has become a lot better since back then, and with each new album, the band’s music has become more cohesive. Their latest, Mirror Traffic, is no exception. The music on Mirror Traffic doesn’t differ a whole lot, musically, from previous Jicks or Pavement. But Malkmus’ lyrics are a bit sassier and more sarcastic than on previous releases and the addition of Beck as producer adds a lot more texture and tone to the songs, which definitely helps keep my attention through the entire album. The highlight of the album has to be track five, “Jumblegloss.” The guitar work on that jam is goddamn exceptional. –Jon Robertson

Sundress
Sundress EP
Self-released
Street: 08.16
Sundress = early Radiohead + Spacehog + Foals
Classic car-inspired, stainless steel frame time machine moment! Let’s go back to when Radiohead weren’t the best, yet craziest band in the whole entire world—back when they were still almost The Cure wannabes with a deeper love for distorted guitar. Turns out someone cloned them, powered up the flux capacitor and brought them to modern central Texas. WTF? Who would do such a thing? Who cares? The result, now called Sundress, is actually pretty excellent. Vocals by Ryan McAdams are spot-on for Thom Yorke’s eerie croon, and the rest combine to form spaced-out crescendos similar to the slower end of OK Computer or Foals’ Total Life Forever, without the math. Nevertheless, this is basically The Bends all over again, but like that’s a bad thing. The most exciting part is, this band is young, so I can’t wait to see what happens if they continue to evolve like the real Radiohead did. –Rio Connelly