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Reviews by Scottie

76 total search results — Page 4 of 4

Goldfinger – Hello Destiny

Review — May 26, 2008

Men in their late-thirties making vague statements about the future's uncertainty under the guise of it being punk rock, there's something concerning about this. It's as if their quarter-life crisis is stretching into mid-life, arresting their development into adulthood. Hello Destiny, the newest album by Goldfinger, finds the SoCal …

New Found Glory – Tip of the Iceberg

Review — June 9, 2008

Temporarily free agents of the scene, New Found Glory found themselves in a position few established bands have. They could record whatever they wanted whenever they wanted and have it released by whoever would. Other acts with multi-albums contracts often have a two-year time window for their next album with …

Look Mexico – The Crucial Collection

Review — June 13, 2008

No band begins as brilliant; the songs can be good, but they're only skeletons of the potential a band might possess. It takes years of practice, scattered releases, and thousands of hours between writing, touring, and practicing before a group fully realizes itself. Introduced to Look Mexico with their first …

Fuck Buttons – Street Horrrsing

Review — July 22, 2008

When I was eleven my mother asked me if the family should remodel our basement, converting it into a living room and bedrooms for both my sister and me. Heading into middle school, a time when children begin to blossom socially, I thought this was a great idea. The freedoms …

The Hold Steady – Stay Positive

Review — July 23, 2008

Stay Positive, the fourth album finds the Brooklyn by way of Minneapolis The Hold Steady trying to further their scope as musicians and lyricists while also tackling a greater challenge: aging gracefully. While there are stumbling points to the album, the band holds steady. It's these falters though that …

Annihilation Time – III: Tales of the Ancient Age

Review — August 3, 2008

With fuzzy riffs, elongated solos and twin guitar leads ala Maiden, this is a Hessian's dream. On III: Tales of the Ancient Age, Annihilation Time leaves the D.R.I. thrash influence in a cloud of bong smoke to focus on their shredding. That is, when they aren't ingesting chemicals, breaking …

Trash Talk – Trash Talk

Review — August 6, 2008

Trash Talk, the hype band come hardcore mainstays through relentless touring, have a lot of eyes and ears on them with the release of their self-titled album. Adhering to the D.I.Y. ethics that are the backbone of punk, the Sacramento band opted to release their newest album themselves, leaving behind …

Lagwagon – I Think My Older Brother Used to Listen to Lagwagon

Review — September 17, 2008

Closing in on twenty years as a band, Lagwagon presents us with new songs, perhaps aiming to revive that nearly defunct Fat/Epitaph sound. Having grown up on this band, I was giddy to hear they were releasing new material for the first time since 2005's Resolve, but found myself bummed …

Off With Their Heads – From the Bottom

Review — September 28, 2008

Remember when the Dropkick Murphy's were good, when they were still a bunch of drunken rabble-rousers instead of highbrow hooligans cashing in on the idea that if you give any goon a Guinness or Smitwicks, it'll make them Irish? Can't remember that far back? It's been a few years. Want …

They and the Children – Home

Review — October 1, 2008

What if Deathreat cited Pink Floyd as an influence? Or Isis listened to more d-beat? The result would be spacey and sludgy, ambient while devastating. While these seem like polar opposites in the world of dense music, Connecticut's They and the Children blend these styles with near perfection on their …

Population Reduction – Each Birth a New Crime

Review — October 1, 2008

Like weed? What about beer? Okay, here's the clincher: what about loud as shit cynicism rammed into your sloping skull at diarrhea speed? Yeah? Check out Each Birth a New Disaster, the first album by Population Reduction, a two man grind band from San Francisco that drills your eardrums …

Fucked Up – The Chemistry of Common Life

Review — October 13, 2008

In Fucked Up's early years, they only released songs on seven-inch records, two songs at time, sometimes three, very rarely four or more. Songs during the fifties and sixties were released in a similar fashion, the jukebox single on the a-side with one or two more on the back. Songs …

Dillinger Four – C I V I L W A R

Review — November 9, 2008

As my age teeters closer to thirty than twenty, I continually ask myself three important questions: Am I still punk? Was I ever? Does it matter? Sure my love of punk music grows exponentially with every year I age, but is it just a label for me to wear on …

Joey Cape – Bridge

Review — February 18, 2009

Where does the aging punk-rocker go when his band's presence in the scene has all but evaporated, releasing new material only when the mortgage has to be paid or a new mouth to feed has entered the family unit, touring mostly when the opportunity is to travel overseas? He goes …

Coffins / XXX Maniak – The Cracks of Doom

Review — February 25, 2009

To offend me takes special talent, talent that knows no boundaries to how far the one can push idea of indecency. People who believe there is nothing sacred, no subject matter too taboo that they cannot molest it. These people play in the XXX Maniak. The cover art alone on …

Japanther – Tut Tut Now Shake Ya Butt

Review — March 3, 2009

In the city of Brooklyn, New York's hippest borough, the pretensions of musicians trying to create songs that are both avant garde and widely accessible (a clear paradox) makes for a stifling scene. Lofts and warehouse spaces across the neighborhoods of Williamsburg and Bushwick are filling with passive young professionals …