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Our latest album reviews, featuring the records we've most enjoyed (or not) over the past few weeks.

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Browse our album reviews according to score: Highest (9.5/10 or more) or Lowest (2/10 or less)

Liquids

More Thana Friend EP
Drunken Sailor (2017)

English record label Drunken Sailor Records released this sweet and short EP. For some reason that made me believe Liquids are an English band. And that’s not only because this EP is released on an English label. The band sounds like they could be from that funny little island. I was wrong though. Dead wrong. Liquids hails from Indiana. And as I have recently discovered, have that certain Indiana sound. There is scene bursting with bands delivering music with more or less the same influences as Liquids, such as The Coneheads (with whom Liquids shares a member), ZAP, ABC Gum, etc etc. But, back to Liquids. More Thana Friend (I guess the spelling error isn’t accidental, as I see it repeated everywhere) is part of a large series of albums and EPs. The band is really productive. After listening to a bit of their earlier work I conclude that the band is consistent in their sound. There’s no grand deviation or experimentation on this EP. Instead you get what the band does best: raw and catchy garage punk. The production of this EP is lo-fi and pretty primitive. If you want your punk sounding smooth, this band is not for … Read more

Laura Marling

Semper Femina
More Alarming Records (2017)

Laura Marling was routinely described as being precocious when she first started making her own music as a teenager. She … Read more

Dodecahedron

Kwintessens
Season of Mist (2017)

The word quintessence derives from the Latin “quintus” and the english “essence,” translated roughly to the fifth essence. The reason … Read more

Max Richter

Three Worlds: Music From Woolf Works
Deutsche Grammophon (2017)

Neo-classical music and minimalistic explorations always had a point of convergence. Minimal electronic applications found their way into classical orchestrations, … Read more

The Obsessed

Sacred
Relapse (2017)

The Obsessed belongs in the category of the legendary American doom acts. Formed during the '70s as Warhorse, they truly … Read more

Greg Graffin

Millport
Anti (2017)

Greg Graffin has always been a big influence on the way I approach things. I love punk rock, but there … Read more

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One from the archives

In First Person / Storm the Bastille

Split
Ape Must Not Kill Ape / Protag (2008)

200 Words Or Less

In First Person from New Jersey starts off the a-side with their dissonant and pummeling metallic hardcore sound. The band's highly concentrated and volatile sound is reminiscent of Cursed, Tragedy, and Deadguy. The three-piece outfit, which boasts former members of You and I as well as The Assistant, destroys it on these four songs. If you missed their previous full-length, I suggest you go back and grab that as well. This band could easily be huge. On the flip side we've got Storm the Bastille from Pennsylvania, which is a stellar name for a band. In comparison, things are a tad less vicious on this side with Storm the Bastille opting for a screamo/power-violence sound. I'd compare them to Joshua Fit for Battle or even older Underoath, when they were … Read more

More album reviews

The Great Old Ones

EOD: A Tale of Dark Legacy
Season of Mist (2017)

The influence of H.P. Lovecraft in popular culture is undeniable, and its presence in the metal genre is highlighted from classic Metallica tracks, to off-kilter acts like Blind Idiot God. The Great Old Ones, a French post-black metal outfit, proudly embrace this tradition, as their suggests, exploring the themes of cosmicism through the years, starting with their debut album, Al … Read more

Paco Sala

The Silent Season
Denovali (2017)

Paco Sala is the strange, outsider pop project of producer Anthony Harrison and singer Marie-Pascale Hardy. Having released a series of albums, with their main goal being the tinkering of pop structures and norm, The Silent Season marks their fifth full-length, and is the first of their works to be released through experimental label Denovali.The production of this record is … Read more

Hellmouth

Oblivion
Fast Break Records (2017)

When I heard my first Hellmouth record—which I’ve since learned was their second release (Gravestone Skylines, 2010)—it was more of a curiosity than something that really grabbed me. Here was Jay Navarro of Suicide Machines in a metal band. His voice definitely fits the style, but the riff-dominant vitriol was such a transition that it threw me off. I enjoyed … Read more

Pallbearer

Heartless
Profound Lore Records/Nuclear Blast Records (2017)

Pallbearer’s evolution over the last seven or so years has been one that seems natural and organic, with each record building on what came before and giving the Arkansas based band a step forward on the ladder towards greatness. Their demo of 2010 introduced a band indebted to doom greats Black Sabbath, but the inclusion of a cover of Billie … Read more

Sorority Noise

You’re Not As _____ As You Think
Triple Crown (2017)

What is emo? A classicist view may lend itself to sounds like The Promise Ring’s Nothing Feels Good or Weezer’s Pinkerton, which gave way to second-generation icons like Brand New. While The Promise Ring and especially Weezer never really quite built on the successes of their early records, Brand New began as a yawpy pop-punk band that suddenly transformed into … Read more

Ash Borer

The Irrepassable Gate
Profound Lore (2016)

Haunting, mournful, and soulful, Ash Borer dials in with a killer new slab of music with The Irrepassable Gate; and the band tosses down the gauntlet with a densely layered album that breathes and stretches and smolders and seethes in a gorgeous cacophony that hints at mystic imagery and hidden arcane knowledge. The four members of the band seemingly take … Read more

Falls of Rauros

Vigilance Perennial
Bindrune Recordings / Nordvis Produktion (2017)

There has always been a pull in the black metal genre towards a folk interpretation. It is not that far of a leap, and since the first releases in the genre, bands have been crossing borders left and right, be it the early experiments of Ulver, or the big turn of Bathory with Hammerheart and Twilight of the Gods. Agalloch's … Read more

Ensemble Economique

In Silhouette
Denovali (2017)

Brian Pyle, the individual behind Ensemble Economique, begun a crazy trip as a member of Starving Weirdos in the mid '00s. This insane musical duo, featuring Pyle alongside Merrick McKinlay, traversed the paths of rock and electronic music, applying deranged psychedelia, resulting in the impossibility of pigeonholing their musical endeavors. After the group disbanded, Pyle was left unsatisfied with the … Read more

Mastodon

Emperor of Sand
Warner Bros. (2017)

There have been few bands as exciting to watch their ascension into music legend than Mastodon. What's that you say? No, the term 'legend' is not hyperbole. Mastodon is just that good. And if there's any justice in this cold, cruel world, that legendary status will be hermetically sealed with Emperor of Sand.Emperor of Sand is mastodon's seventh full-length release … Read more

White Willow

Future Hopes
Lasers Edge Records (2017)

They call it prog-rock, art-rock, jazz-rock, they call it tedious and pretentious, they call it heady, too-much, reserved as the best time to get a drink at the bar or shop the merch table….White Willow’s record Future Hopes assists in refuting that argument.I like when a musician takes an idea to its very end, and when it’s done right, time … Read more

Multiple Authors

The Menzingers

After The Party
Epitaph (2017)

The Menzingers are a four-piece punk band from Scranton, PA, sharing the same hometown as band sibling Tigers Jaw. Although not musically the same, The Menzingers have a similar lyrical purpose to The Smiths: to tell detailed, emotional narratives about everyday people. Except, instead of about middle-aged well-read women and ambiguously gay recluses, it’s about 20-somethings sporting tattoos of high … Read more

Multiple Authors

The Menzingers

After The Party
Epitaph (2017)

For the past 7 or so years I have been saying that The Menzingers are the best current punk band around. Not only do they put on a hell of a live show, but their records resonate weeks, months, years after listening to them. A punk band that manages to stay relevant, it's impressive. The Menzingers are a band that … Read more

Woe

Hope Attrition
Vendetta (2017)

After a promising start to a career that began in earnest with the release of debut A Spell for the Death of Man in 2008 and continued through to 2013s Withdrawal, Woe’s fate took a turn soon after that many bands find themselves encountering – real life happened and the music took a backseat for founder Chris Grigg and his … Read more

Totally Unicorn

Dream Life
Farmer & The Owl Records (2016)

Complex, highly technical, unusual time signatures.Staccato and syncopated polyrhythmic guitar melodies.Mathcore.Yawn.Does not sound fun to you?Alright - enter nudity, booze fueled shenanigans and fascinating borderline performance art live incarnations.Enter Totally Unicorn from Wollongong, NSW South Wales, Australia.Dream Life is their first impressive full length, which was released in 2016 and surprised quite a few of their followers: Not that it … Read more

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Browse our album reviews according to score: Highest (9.5/10 or more) or Lowest (2/10 or less)