The violin can be a beautiful thing and there are surely moments on Entanglement – sound artist/Silver Mt Zion member Jessica Moss’ sophomore outing, out next week via Constellation – that are engaging, even rapturous. But in the end, the new LP is just that and, sadly, that alone: a collection of beautiful moments or…
Review: Peel Dream Magazine – “Modern Meta Physic”
Peel Dream Magazine, a fuzzy-eared nod, in part, to BBC man-about-town John Peel, makes pillowy, fey and sometimes borderline-experimental pop. And on the group’s new LP – Modern Meta Physic, out recently via Slumberland – they do a pretty fine job of it, or at least that’s the vantage point from this tower. On songs…
Review: The Jacob Duncan Quintet – “It’s Alright To Dream”
I just feel cool, like everything’s alright, when I’m listening to Jacob Duncan, don’t you? Well, thankfully for all of us who like feeling like the world’s not completely coming apart at the seams, the talented Louisville saxophonist is back after his debut, The Busker, won over critics with a few tricks up his sleeve and a…
Review: HHY & The Macumbas – “Beheaded Totem”
Dub filtered through with tribal polyrhythms and a touch of mysticism is the name of the game on Beheaded Totem, the sophomore LP from Portugese experimentalists HHY & The Macumbas, out a few days ago via House of Mythology. While that description could send some of the more ambitious listeners among us into fits of…
Review: Mudhoney – “Digital Garbage”
Mudhoney, which is now running strong past its 30th year of existence, has never really been that topical. (I mean, c’mon, “Touch Me, I’m Sick” hardly had policy implications.) Leave it to frontman Mark Arm, though, to shake up the established order of things. On the Pacific Northwest band’s new LP — Digital Garbage, out yesterday…
Review: Low – “Double Negative”
Every time I listen to Double Negative — the unsettling and ambitious new record from Low, out recently via Sub Pop – I am reminded of the video for the record’s first single, “Quorum.” Edited into a kind of disorienting, rapid-edit triptych, the black-and-white film juxtaposes blurred photos of the band members, at once pensive…
Profile: Microwaves (2018)
Microwaves is at a crossroads. The Pittsburgh trio, which has been soldering together noise-rock, no wave and art-metal for 18 years now, has a new record out September 28 – a barn-burner titled, Via Weightlessness on Three One G, a label run by The Locust’s Justin Pearson. And while the band has been down this road before…
Profile: Marc Ribot (2018)
The separation of immigrant children from their parents. The trashing of the Paris Agreement on climate change. The white nationalism. The Mueller investigation. The Tweets. The wall. There’s been no shortage of reasons to hate Donald Trump and his lie-filled House of Whiteness. Marc Ribot’s heard more than a few of them. But what prompted…
Review: Iron & Wine – “Weed Garden”
I don’t know what to make of Sam Beam’s latest outing, an Iron & Wine EP titled, cleverly if mockingly, Weed Garden. (It was released a few days ago on multiple formats by Sub Pop.) In some respects, it’s very easy to hear how much of this material was coaxed into existence around the same…
Review: The Zells – “Failure To Slide”
The Zells, the newly rechristened Pittsburgh garage-rock quintet f.k.a. Denzell, has a new record out this Friday via the fine folks at Crafted Sounds and, man, is it a doozy. In terms of the method and initiation of the band’s 13-track full-length debut, Failure To Slide calls to mind Pavement, for sure, with all of…