by kevin diamond (pics by nick zinner, ilovemetric.com, kirstiecat, & lure design)
I guess calling these bands mainstream isn’t quite right, but since SXSW is picking up the slack this week showcasing the up and coming talents (that is SXSW’s job, right?) I thought I’d highlight some albums about to drop by some proven favorites. Enjoy.
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Metric makes up for the Yeah Yeah Yeahs by bringing the rock. Emily Haines’ lyrics are just as paranoid and depressing as always, which, in my opinion, plays much better with the rock band backing, as opposed to her more self-indulgent solo gig. This track is a great kick off to Fantasies, an album that occasionally missteps but has enough stellar tracks to make it a more than worthwhile listen. The album is streaming on their website now.
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The second Handsome Furs album, Face Control, absolutely slays their first release. Which is surprising, as the second Wolf Parade album was such a disappointment. Perhaps he was saving all his good songs for this album. This song has a “I Want Candy” electronic beat, grinding guitar and a chorus that makes me think of The Boss. Strange combo but it works.
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Well, you’re gonna have something to worry about when people hear the new PB&J album Living Things. Other than this beat-heavy, catchy track, nothing on this album jumped out and demanded my attention. You can’t phone in an album that’s supposed to follow up the (unfairly heaped) hype that came with Writers Block, but it appears that’s what they did. At least they didn’t take the easy road and just make an album of “Young Folks” rip offs. I don’t think I could take that much whistling.
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Nobody does power-pop like Phoenix. They’re like a french Strokes who never started sucking. And on this album, the awesomely-titled Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, they’ve even started taking some risks, like the 7+ minute long “Love Like A Sunset.” Those risks are paying off. This may be the best album of the season.
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Yes, Yes, YES. I love The Thermals. And while Now We Can See is no match for their last album, The Body, The Blood, The Machine, It’s no slouch either. Body, Blood… was an epic tale of religion and sacrifice belted and bruised by The Thermal’s simple yet powerful style. Now We Can See seems to touch upon similar themes, with a slightly less obvious through line, but it’s still effective.
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I guess if I had to pick a favorite track from this It’s Blitz, YYY’s disapointing third album, it’d be this one. Sorry for the ennui, but it’s all I can give to these guys now. They don’t sound like the same band that made the scorching rocker “Art Star,” nor do the remind me of the band that penned the plaintive, anthemic “Maps.” Instead they’re a second-rate Blondie, giving us dance when we’ve got nothing to dance about. It just seems like, with the country as angry as it is, YYY’s should be playing their hand differently, and capitalizing on what they do best.
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At this point, either you’ve heard the leak or you haven’t. I thought I’d post the Grizzly Bear sanctioned high-quality MP3 of one of the best tracks on the album. Get pumped.
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Haven’t heard all of Swan Lake’s new album Enemy Mine yet, but it’s a promising turn towards more accessible music for these three weird, wild, and totally unique songsmiths.
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Seriously, these guys need to listen to less Yes and more of their early albums. I haven’t enjoyed a Decemberists record in about 5 years. Hazard of Love is a meandering, overwrought prog opera, of which “The Rake’s Song” is a welcomed three minute relief.
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Dan Deacon deconstructs and reconstructs the minimalist electropunk that the future requires on his new album Broomst. Pay attention.
9 Comments
Love the post kev. My only interjection is that emily haines’ solo album & ep are not to be taken for granted. It’s a secret club of people that can truly appreciate the poignance with the allegory. She may wallow in the struggle but she maintains the upperhand by creating all that she does…
This headline image turns me on
Alex is blinded by them titties…
This blog kicks ass, great posts! I cant wait for the Metric album! That’s going to make my year.
Hi
Just wanted to let you know that I was impressed with several of the tracks you’ve put up here.
It was the Decemberists mp3 that got me here via The Hype Machine. I’ll check out your archive pages later.
Incidentally, I’m just listening to American Woman by The Guess Who as I type this. An old, old track just like me – do you know it?
Cheers, Spence
It’s hard not to know American Woman. That’s the song that Lenny Kravitz totally butchered.
“I guess if I had to pick a favorite track from this It’s Blitz, YYY’s disapointing third album, it’d be this one. Sorry for the ennui, but it’s all I can give to these guys now. They don’t sound like the same band that made the scorching rocker “Art Star,” nor do the remind me of the band that penned the plaintive, anthemic “Maps.” Instead they’re a second-rate Blondie, giving us dance when we’ve got nothing to dance about. It just seems like, with the country as angry as it is, YYY’s should be playing their hand differently, and capitalizing on what they do best.”
I haven’t heard the album – well, ANY of YYY’s full albums, to be honest, but I’ve actually been thinking about this off and on since I first read it, and during the Great Depression, people would flock to movie theaters to see the biggest, glitziest, frothiest musicals that have ever been produced in Hollywood. And many of them are justifiably considered great works of art.
Just because life is hard, doesn’t mean that people need or want to be inundated with anger, righteous or not, on every side. The right song can be good for the soul, even if it is just a dance song.
Telling artists what they “should” be doing seems…presumptuous to me. If the album doesn’t work for you, it doesn’t work, but just because it doesn’t speak to you, doesn’t mean it won’t speak to anyone.
rigmarole- if you read this, I appreciate your sentiment and mostly agree with you. I regret the attitude I displayed in that snooty paragraph. I hope you read Jon Ledoux’s review of the album cause he really nailed the situation. Still don’t dig the album, but you were totally right about my tone.
Fraudulent While this