Ills
Hideout From The Feeders
Aloe Music
Street: 11.12
Ills = Blank Dogs + Modest Mouse + Her Space Holliday
This album mixes aspects I’m fond of—catchy progressions matched on bass and guitar that give the rhythm a thickness I could move to—with aspects I could leave behind, like vocals that sometimes sound a little too much like Isaac Brock, for example. But then songs like “Colleen” pull me in with high-pitched, thin guitar riffs that complement the choruses, and vocals that now remind me of those on Wavves’ “Green Eyes.” The next track, “Coma”—a dark song with moving bass lines, a semi-prominent ’80s-era synth sound and little guitar—works for me, too. If the whole album sounded like the cluster of goodness in the middle, it would get more plays from me, but how it is gives me mixed feelings. –Steve Richardson