Tag: review
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Beldam – Still the Wretched Linger
Richmond might have recently put Virginia on the map when it comes to downtuned doom, with outfits ranging from Cough to Inter Arma to Windhand, but the sludge seems to be seeping eastward to another college town an hour away. Beldam hails from Charlottesville, home of the Hoos, and their debut album is as gritty…
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Kriegs Legion – The Anti-State War Machine EP
It’s impossible to listen to Kriegs Legion‘s new EP and not flash on the crew of bands which came before them who didn’t exactly typify hardcore or punk rock in any manner but did explode forth with a sound and vision all their own under those banners. Bands of this tradition included names like D.O.A., Cosmic…
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Bum City Saints – Bum City Saints LP
While some critics may claim that an album or artist being “derivative” is a negative trait, that’s not always true – in the right context. Sometimes, the right sequence of sonic elements can align and instantly throw listeners back into the mindset thought to be long forgotten. It can be exhilarating and comforting all at the…
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Cheap Trick – At Budokan, The Complete Concert (2 LP reissue)
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Record Store Day reissue of At Budokan – The Complete Concert 2-LP by Cheap Trick. The 1970s are known for lots of things which happened musically, like the break-up of The Beatles, the deaths of Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, John Bonham and Elvis Presley,…
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Fews – Means LP
Even at first sight – before a note of music is heard from the Means LP – those who happen upon Fews‘ debut full-length will get the sense that they’re about to bear witness to an important musical EVENT. The front cover poses a bunch of very tantalizing questions. On it, a camera captures a…
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Booze & Glory – Carry On
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the diecut Carry On single by Booze & Glory The catch about the genre that’s affectionately known as “street punk” is that those who make the music often do not make it for very long. The reason for that is simple: street punk is impoverished by nature…
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Comet Control – Center of the Maze
This is the second release from Toronto psych rock outfit Comet Control, following their self-titled debut in 2014. A couple of these guys have some history with Tee Pee stalwarts Quest for Fire, although I found their new outfit to be a little more structured and poppy than its predecessor. Before I give that one…
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Arctic – self-titled
Three California skaters drop out, tune down and start jamming. Based on that backstory, I’m expecting some kinda cross between Earthless and The Shrine, and Arctic doesn’t totally disappoint on their debut EP. “Over Smoked” kicks off this five-track effort, a nine-minute slow burn that gets heads nodding almost from the get-go with its heavy-psych…
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It’s Not Night, It’s Space – Our Birth is But a Sleep and a Forgetting
This instro heavy-psych trio hails from New Paltz, a small town in New York’s Hudson Valley, which I believe is on the bus route from Cooperstown to Kingston, NY. After a couple independently released albums, they’ve signed to Small Stone for this, their third record. The artist often shortened to INNIS seems to share post-rock’s…
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Throttlerod – Turncoat
These Virginia veterans and Small Stone mainstays have just put out their first album in almost seven years. Turncoat is album number five from this heavy-rock outfit, and their fourth for the Detroit label, to which they’ve been signed almost since the turn of the century. (They have the distinction of covering “Black Betty” on…