After a battle with cancer this past summer and the subsequent delayed release of the album, Sharon Jones returns with her Dap-Kings, more powerful than ever, with the appropriately titled Give the People What They Want—the follow-up to 2010’s I Learned the Hard Way. … read more
Is it just me (it usually is), or are our soundwaves over-saturated with quiet, reflective singer songwriters, playing the kind of bland folk that attracts men who use mustache combs and apprentice beekeepers? Sherman Baker might quell this problem. … read more
Straight up, this album will be playing when your soul goes through purgatory and wanders wistfully from heaven to hell. Fully ambient music is not my cup of tea, but this is something I’d listen to if I wanted to have a drug-induced, life-changing experience. … read more
It’s a strange, varied affair, playing like a lost soundtrack to something doomed, yet beautiful. The music ranges from synth-based melody and filtered noise (“Summer Wheels/ Mysterious Fires”), to tape-hiss-laden acoustic ballads. … read more
Songs like his cover of “Backdoor Man” will put you on your ass. Biram, to me, has become the Southern roots music modern Hemingway, expressing honestly the dark parts of this life like only he can. … read more
Hey Daydreamer is an album full of theatrics. Not only is the instrumentation elaborate, with emphasis on the horns and percussion, but the overall feeling I get from listening to this is uplifting, as she sings about finding strength in independence, throwing out bad influences and living with your mistakes. … read more
I wouldn’t be surprised if bands like Signals Midwest, The Front Bottoms and other emo-revivalists start getting serious radio play in two years or so. Their mathy rhythms, straightforward guitar-work and harmony-laden vocals are just screaming radio potential. … read more
This full-length debut album is a DIY-style reverb mash-up of ’60s girl groups and ’80s New Wave, and comes from Dublin noise pop group September Girls. … read more
Proudly declaring themselves as the torchbearers of “passionate ’emo’… before the shopping malls got a hold of the genre,” Secret Smoker know exactly what they’re going for and they firmly hit that bullseye. … read more
Septicflesh had a hard task to make something greater than their last record, The Great Mass. Titan is a more than appropriate title for the epically epic damned ninth album from the Greek metal masters. … read more
State of Alert (S.O.A.) is one of the unsung heroes of the Washington, D.C. hardcore scene. They were a flash in the pan, existing for less than a year before disbanding in the summer of 1981. Led by a 19-year-old Henry Rollins, they recorded eight songs.
… read more
Ramona Lisa Arcadia Terrible Street: 04.15 Ramona Lisa = Space Project + St. Vincent / Little Dragon Chairlift frontwoman, Caroline Polacheck, frequents an alternate universe known as Arcadia, inspired by European landscapes and the intricate beauties of insects. Her solo debut is an invitation to explore this realm, her offering of worthy art in the
