New album from Sons And Daughters in June

Breaking Fun unveils darker themes and sparse sonics of Mirror, Mirror, the follow up to 2008’s This Gift and a very different beast to its predecessor.

Produced by long time friend and fellow Glaswegian JD Twitch of Optimo, Mirror Mirror sees Sons And Daughters return to their earlier works, stripping back their sound, abandoning some of their signature ‘full on punk rock guitar” to introduce a more electronic feel and recording only on 16-track.

Breaking Fun is available on 7” single and download from June 6th and is backed with Giallo. The album Mirror Mirror was released on June 13th.

Here is a link to stream Breaking Fun
Sons & Daughters – Breaking Fun by DominoRecordCo

The Head and The Heart – s/t

Like many who have discovered the Pacific Northwest’s The Head and the Heart, I came by the band via their song “Rivers and Roads”. It’s such a beautiful slice of modern folk balladry that one can’t help but take notice. The band’s name has spread like wildfire as their self-released debut lit a flame in the Seattle area. Enter Sub Pop and a re-release, and you’ve got a bona fide independent success story.

However, it’s hard to miss the lukewarm reviews of The Head and the Heart’s self-titled debut. Folks have referred to this album as lackluster and too slick to be true Americana. As I heard about The Head and The Heart while listening to The Head and The Heart, I wondered if those naysayers were listening to the same collection of lovely folk-pop songs. While I find the collection of 10 songs here more breezy California pop than Americana, I can’t deny that these are some catchy, catchy tunes.

I’d surely agree with anyone who claims The Head and The Heart aren’t overtly innovative – I’ve certainly heard similar music done just as well. But not everyone needs to find some shred of land not yet tread upon. Yet when Jonathan Russell and Josiah Johnson (both providing vocals, guitar) sing one can’t help but sing along. Charity Thielan (violin, vocals) also provides some of the more haunting vocal moments on The Head and The Heart, especially the aforementioned “Rivers and Roads”.

Like many folk-pop outfits, there’s a little bit of everything thrown in the mix stylistically. The band tackles gospel with “Sounds Like Hallelujah” and “Heaven Go Easy on Me” as well as more straightforward pop on “Honey Come Home” and “Cats and Dogs”. While “Rivers and Roads” is certainly a great introduction to the band, it’s these more upbeat numbers – including “Ghosts” and its wonderfully bouncy piano work – that craft The Head and The Heart into an album worthy of many repeated listens. If well-crafted folk-pop leaves you feeling lukewarm, by all means join the naysayers; otherwise, I’ll be on the side of those dancing and singing along.

Sub Pop

 

Anaal Nathrakh – Passion

One does not exactly sit and listen to Anaal Nathrakh but rather allows a complete and thorough violation upon the senses. The band’s aural assault is all consuming and blatantly violent. The group from Birmingham, UK bring their own brand of black and death metal, with infusions of many other genres such as grindcore and industrial, stripping it down and converting it into an intense and viscerally intrusive sound. Since forming in 1999, Anaal Nathrakh, comprising of the duo of vocalist Dave Hunt (known as V.I.T.R.I.O.L.) and Mick Kenney (Irrumator), have been forging a devastating path that undoubtedly inspires varied opinions about their music and always tests the listener’s tolerance and stamina. Their new album Passion released on Candlelight Records is no exception – a withering, sonically loaded release of extreme metal that stirs much more than just surface reactions.

The album starts with “Volenti Non Fit Iniuria”, with its light and foreboding dark build up erupting into a driving frenzy of noise that is not too far from what is expected from Anaal Nathrakh. The spit-loaded vocal screams and grunts of Dave Hunt are harsh and intrusively stalk the crushing sounds of Kenney. There has been a suggestion that with Passion there would be the addition of new elements to their music and from the opener one can see some different flavours but nothing that deeply changes what is expected from the band. The psychotic tortured bedlam of “Drug-Fucking Abomination” follows, its seven minutes of grinding industrial like destruction interspersed with progressive sounds laced with desperate vocals which bring the mental chaotic break down to the fore.

There is a good consistency throughout the album, whether from the extreme and brief predatory onslaughts of “Post Traumatic Stress Euphoria” or “Locus Of Damnation” or the purer black metal, crusading riff quality of the best track on the release, “Le Diabolique est L’Ami du Simple”. The latter with its mainly clean vocals laced with hellish screams is imperious and soars above the other tracks, its symphonic flavour lying easily within the imposing drums and heavy riffs, all combining to inspire disturbing images and emotions.

As is regular on their releases Anaal Nathrakh has guest vocalists on a couple of the tracks. Rainer Landfermann (Pavor, Bethlehem) features on “Tod Huetet Uebel”, a challenging track that echoes around the head long after it ends. Though the vocals are fine there is a feeling that Hunt would have done a better and more consistent job in relation to the rest of the album. The other addition is Gnaw vocalist Alan Dubin on “Ashes Screaming Silence”, an explosive deathcore/industrial beast of a track with melodic, clean vocals which fight valiantly against the growling monster surrounding them. The result is very effective and extremely satisfying.

Passion is a good, solid album containing great imposing sounds and songs – each track when dissected shows a well constructed and satisfying layered piece of music – but much is lost underneath the oppressive and crushing delivery and attack. It certainly is worth investigating, and existing fans of Anaal Nathrakh will savour it as much as anything from the band in the past. Passion will also have you running for an ice cold shower just to test if any of your senses are still working from listening to it.

www.myspace.com/anaalnathrakh

Crystal Swells release new cassette

Crystal Swells – Noisy, Weird and Oh So Good
“Patent Trolls”: http://www.bantermm.com/tracks/CrystalSwells-PatentTrolls.mp3

Picture a beautiful beach on a sunny day. Think of all the families, pets, children, joy, happiness and normality intertwining on those sandy recesses. Now imagine this saccharine boredom getting swamped by a tsunami of sludge, noise, waves and weirdness. That’s what happens to rock and roll when under the influence of Crystal Swells. 4 laissez-faire hombres playing squalled out punk/surf/grunge rock, they shred and drone with the greatest of ease, making fans faint with their shirtless, onstage death stares. Loud Fast Hard Ready.

Limited edition cassettes of Crystal Swells‘ album Goethe Head Soup available on Bandcamp: http://crystalswells.bandcamp.com/

 

The Rosebuds – Loud Planes Fly Low

The marital fiascos and domestic entanglements of our society’s celebrities have always made ideal fodder for primetime news programs and weekly periodicals; in the well lit studios of 20/20 and on the glossy pages of People magazine, romantic failures tend to take on a surreal aura, where camp and melodrama keep us endlessly entertained but mask the pernicious nature of the situation.  In the past five years, social networking and blogging have only served to elevate the talebearing nature of the breakups of the rich and famous, feeding our voyeuristic desires with everything from candid tweets and ill-advised Facebook posts to questionable Youtube videos and sordid sexting exchanges.

With all of the hullabaloo that’s typically generated when two stars decide to split up, it can be difficult to remember that, beneath all of the histrionics and spectacle, there are two deeply wounded people struggling to plot their next move.  Most folks wouldn’t consider Ivan Howard or Kelly Crisp – of the Raleigh, NC indie pop act the Rosebuds – to be heavyweights on the fame scale, but their recently dissolved marriage has nonetheless received a fair deal of press, and rightfully so – it’s not every day that a husband/wife band with a decade’s worth of critically acclaimed music decide to end their union and chronicle the entire episode through song.

Loud Planes Fly Low is the first Rosebuds product from Howard and Crisp that finds the recently divorced duo operating only as bandmates.  Since it was their amorous connection that caused the band to materialize in the first place, it seems only fitting that the two would employ their musical chemistry to examine the reasons behind the dissipation of that love.  Far removed from the sort of breakup pageantry exhibited by bigger names (Did you see Jack White and Karen Elson’s recently released divorce party invitation?), the album sidesteps any kitschy fluff and goes right for the throat with an intensely personal documentation of a passionate affair gone wrong.

The music of Loud Planes Fly Low is by turns sweet and somber, rousing and reflecting, majestic and melancholy – qualities long associated with the Rosebuds.  Still though, the gravitas comes through with greater force here, and the fact that the music exhibits so much restraint despite such interpersonal turmoil only makes the experience all the more disarming.  Yet divorce or not, it’s the melodies that pull the biggest punches here.  The Rosebuds know the value of a good hook, and this record packs plenty of them into 10 fairly concise pop tunes.

Opening track “Go Ahead” is a luscious amalgam of droning organ harmonies, shimmering piano arpeggios, and soaring vocals.  Though the wordless chorus is the most affecting portion of the song, Howard takes great pains to juxtapose the mundane and fantastical portions of his relationship with Crisp, singing “We’ll have coffee / watch the strangers,” and “We’ll make beds in your dresses,” with equal sincerity.  “Second Bird of Paradise” is another early-album standout, melding tremolo-affected keyboards, violin countermelodies, and soulful falsetto vocals with wonderfully evocative lyrics (“She’s my sister / and she floats like a bird in the canopy”).

“Come Visit Me” makes one of the album’s more overt statements, taking a downtrodden disco groove and pairing it with a slinky bass line and Crisp’s outspoken admissions: “I need something happy now / even if it fucks me up.”  The song has that perfect mix of swagger and naked confessionalism, resulting in a resolute yet wounded tone.  After four tracks of reverb-laden dream pop, “Without a Focus” conjures unexpected intensity thanks to a lack of instrumentation; a plaintively strummed acoustic guitar and Ivan Howard’s despondent drawl are the only constants here.

The album’s second half is no less engaging as it veers between urgent arena rock (“Woods”), hypnotic shoegaze (“A Story”), and tender folk meditations (closing track “Worthwhile”).  Having come full circle from the reveries of “Go Ahead” in which Howard imagines himself and Crisp starting over again in some quixotic idyll, “Worthwhile” seeks to reconcile the entire saga altogether, as indicated by lyrics like, “We could’ve had a break when we were tired / we would rest awhile / and I’d try to make you smile / girl, I want to make it all worthwhile.”

It’s not entirely clear yet whether Loud Planes Fly Low will be the Rosebuds’ swan song or simply a restatement of purpose, but either way, the band has delivered one of the most arresting breakup albums since Beck’s Sea Change.

Wild Beasts – Smother

The defining method many use on a band’s catalog is always one that can hold great distinction. For England-based Wild Beasts, they’ve confidently ensured that while their discography is still young, at now three albums rich, it has carried an identity of its own with albums that shine with magnificent melodies and instrumentation. After 2008’s Limbo, Panto, the band took little time to present 2009’s critically-adored Two Dancers. Albums that both presented modestly composed and assured musicians, the latter was easily one of the best revelations of its time. With their latest release, Smother, the band offers a new sound to their diverse spectrum that while dissimilar from its predecessor, is a fine follow-up in many regards.

The enthralling rhythmic patterns and insatiable melody on something like “The Fun Powder Plot” is definitely something starkly amiss on Smother. While there are gorgeous melodies that soar over the polished synths and warm tones, there is never anything quite as rip-roaring as hearing Hayden Thorpe’s ‘booty call’ slip-ups on the aforementioned song. But in many ways, it’s as if Wild Beasts surely planned it this way – with albums that all follow neatly-pieced and arranged set pieces – for after Two Dancers’ varying dynamic shifts and styles, for the next album to be the kind of music to simply delve in. Justly, the music is left much sparser and definitely, much barer, than the infused energy on Two Dancers, but Smother is a sweltering listen on its own accord.

It’s evidently clear, from the very outset, just how much Smother contrasts many of the same concepts seen before. With “Lion’s Share,” the song relies on the climactic feel and release of a highlighted piano and horn line to supplement Thorpe’s nervy vocals, while “Bed of Nails” is much more upbeat with a dancing synth line, the subdued style of the production reveals an intimate progression. These kinds of songs make the best parts of the album, while something like “Invisible” can leave you feeling a bit empty. While there is promise in the development, the bareness of the music leaves too much to be desired. The same happens on “Deeper” and its Low-like tendencies – they might work for other bands but on an outfit that is incredibly dense with musical ideas, the instruments and illustrious layers of instruments are deeply missed.

You surely can’t fault Wild Beasts’ nature in being splendidly consistent. Every album has begun with an enthralling, all-encompassing, engrossing opener that immediately sucks the listener in; however on Smother, the album’s seven-minute closer is easily one of the band’s best songs to date. The band has made a name for itself behind Thorpe’s singular, memorable vocals and their ability at being able to compose stunningly gripping music. Their roots are built around defined musicianship that is purely aesthetic while on a sonic level, always pushing the beams forward. On “End Come Too Soon” the band encircles a swirling melody that trades between a gleaming piano and shimmering guitar. After all of the album’s enveloping sounds, the calming tranquility in the song’s composure is a brilliant ending and one that fittingly caps the ending to a strong album.

Although Smother isn’t as suffocating as perhaps it should be, it’s still an interesting venture for Wild Beasts to have taken and definitely, a worthy follow-up to Two Dancers. And so while there isn’t anything as wildly inventive as maybe “Hooting & Howling” anywhere to be found, there is a great deal of lingering new sounds to get lost in.

Domino Records

Album release in June for Eilen Jewell

Eilen Jewell Creates Indelible Noir-ish Pulp Fiction, Proves Ready For Crown With ‘Queen of the Minor Key’ Out 6/28

“If Neko Case, Madeleine Peyroux and Billie Holiday had a baby girl who grew up to front a rockabilly band, she’d probably sound a lot like Eilen Jewell.”
-Washington Post

On new album ‘Queen of the Minor Key,’ Eilen Jewell and her ace band conjure up songs depicting broken bottles as protection, bad voodoo and Cupid using a sawed-off shotgun instead of a bow and arrow. The dark, often times haunted tales on the album, out June 28 on Signature Sounds Recordings, are fleshed out at points by surf guitar, pedal steel and upright bass, but always hold Jewell’s smoldering voice and unforgettable lyrics center stage.

Lines like “you picked up a broken bottle, in case anyone gave us any trouble, and we walked all the way back to Cortez” (“Santa Fe”) and “I showed you how to kiss, I let you shoot my hats off, ‘cause I knew you wouldn’t miss” (“I Remember You”) showcase Jewell as a lyricist nearing the height of her powers. She’s able to throw out dusky, hyper-detailed phrases, while still finding room for a humorous yet twisted track like “Bang Bang Bang,” which depicts Cupid as “about two years of age, a really freaky thing to see, he was bragging about his sawed-off six gauge, hidden right up his tattered sleeve.”

The lines did not come easily at first, as Jewell was struck with a severe case of writers block when she began the follow-up to the critically acclaimed ‘Sea of Tears.’ To help she retreated to a cabin in the mountains of Idaho, where the Boston-based artist is originally from. With no electricity and no running water, she was able to focus on crafting sketches of songs, breaking her block and building the framework of ‘Queen of the Minor Key.’

Jewell and her longtime band of Jason Beek (drums, harmony vocals), Jerry Miller (electric, acoustic and steel guitars), and Johnny Sciascia (upright bass) turned the sketches into songs. A crack unit with an innate musical connection developed after playing 150-plus shows a year for the last five years, the band has an impressive array of styles and sounds displayed fully on the album. From the rollicking, hard-edged rockabilly surf of the title track to the whining pedal steel and gentle strum of the autobiographical “Santa Fe.”

Jewell and her band will tour relentlessly throughout the rest of 2011, for a full list of tour dates go to:
http://www.eilenjewell.com/

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http://eilenjewell.com/
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Eilen-Jewell/81376011152?v=info
http://www.myspace.com/eilenjewell

Sourvein – Black Fang

Armed with the unrelenting, oppressive blanket of sound sludge/doom metalers Sourvein are known for, comes a new release dripping in uncompromising and punishing noise. Spanning ten pulsating and scathing slabs of metal, Black Fang is an all consuming hungry beast that is sure to delight existing fans of the band and other followers of the darker sludge vein of music.

Since the North Carolina band’s conception in 1993 by vocalist/guitarist T-Roy Medlin, Sourvein have been active with releases of EP’s and split albums. Black Fang (Candlelight Records) is their first full length in almost a decade since the release of Will To Mangle in 2002, and one would imagine is being eagerly anticipated. The first thing to say about this album is it delivers all that one would expect from the band: dense heavy grooves, sonically distorted riffs, and growling cursing vocals. It is fair to say Sourvein has not leap massively forward with their sound, but they still create a swamp of sludge that is very palatable.

From the opening and the title track they hit low and hard – the feedback-drenched, sonically charged slumbering pace driving deep on a collision course with the listener as the guitars of Medlin and King steer the track masterfully. Drummer Jeffrie Moen, though never overpowering, slams the rhythms home hard throughout, leading forth the beast that is Black Fang.

Of all the tracks contained within the album the particular standout ones that raise the bar are “Night Eyes”, with its crawling menacing black groove, the pace switching, suffocating grind of “Gasp” (probably the best track), and the bluesy blackness of “Nomadic”. Add the experimental feel of the closing track “Nocturnal/Negative Phaze” and there alone is a quartet of songs to make the challenge of listening to Black Fang worthwhile.

These great moments are tempered by solid, but regular and almost predictable pieces of formulaic sludge/doom metal such as “Flux”, “Society’s Blood”, and “Holy Transfusion”. The songs are strong, perfectly realised and delivered, but basically they simply create an all too familiar wall of noise as they flow and merge when heard side by side.

Black Fang is a difficult album to judge because it gives everything fans could want: ponderous, dirty sludge filled riffs, harsh grating vocals, and skin stripping aurally assaulting guitars and noise. The problem is that when almost everyone else in the field is producing similar music – with few giving something fresh and new to the genre – it is easy to just pass over this with a simple brief listen, which would be a shame as it does deserve attention. Sourvein is a band with undoubted skill, talent and the ability to produce some of the best senses buffering riffs and ear caressing wicked grooves but they just need to find a crisp freshness to take them to the top table of the genre.

Junior Boys – It’s All True

After the release of their much-maligned, much-overlooked 2009 album, Begone Dull Care, Junior Boys’ main singer, Jeremy Greenspan, took two months off in China. The brief stay awarded him and other member Matt Didemus time to simply disconnect from the intense mirage of life by ways of a cultural clash. While the move certainly drew inspiration on a sonic level, the electronic duo have taken a brand new direction in what might be their most liveliest set of music to date with It’s All True. Although the former’s music was a smothering affair, the latter is still a skillful testament to the tandem’s magnificently eclectic sound while honing in on some new, shining aspects.

A much poppier affair to the more subdued, high-brow IDM they branded on masterpieces like So This is Goodbye, the album asserts itself with a strong presence in catchy grooves. On stuttering “ep” music transfers between the broken up sounds of stellar synths and contrasting drum taps and earlier, on the opening “Itchy Fingers,” the music begins slow and tranquil for a mere five seconds before shifting into hyperdrive. Infusing It’s All True with a clashing drive of fast and rapid sounds is definitely a change of pace from the soothing openers experienced on erstwhile releases. Regardless, the modification in sequencing is surely an afterthought when realizing that still, there is terrific music all over the album.

When thinking about It’s All True’s production values, there is still an undeniable amount of influences that continue to permeate throughout all of Junior Boys’ music. The 80s are still strongly represented on high-paced, keyboard-based songs like “A Truly Happy Ending” and again, on the beautifully-rendered “Banana Ripple” – a song that begins with Greenspan’s breathy vocals to the backdrop of playful synths. It gradually swells into a flourishing mesh of electronic layers – grand and gorgeous – acting as the album’s closing act with some of the finest compositional work the duo has ever created.

Greenspan’s voice, especially, is a stunning development to note that after so many years, it has simply improved. With the aforementioned talk of the album’s sequencing comes the slight folly in placing the disjointed ballad of “Playtime” right after the jittery opener. While there is an argument to be made, there is no denying the fact that fragile and gripping, the vocals are a fitting touch. Even on “Kick the Can” and its aggressive drumming, the incomprehensible vocals add another layer to the music’s snake-like demeanor. Drums and keys trade off between a mixture of rhythms and the minimal twists are carried out by Didemus and Greenspan in meticulous manner. Manipulating your strengths to your favor is something Junior Boys have clearly mastered and fortunately, it continues to thrive.

Four albums in, the music continues to embellish and luckily, entertain for Junior Boys. Even though It’s All True might not be the resounding return of earlier albums, the transitions the duo has embarked on have found them crafting sound into brand new revelations. Progression is always something we take for granted and Junior Boys have never been a pair to settle; they wouldn’t have it any other way with yet another daring album to continue on the entertaining.

Domino Records

Anaal Nathrakh – Passion

First and foremost let me begin by saying that I am only a casual listener of Anaal Nathrakh, because I would question the sanity of anyone who would sit around and listen to this band constantly; but far be it from me to judge a person by musical taste.  That being said, Passion is the audio equivalent of hell being unleashed with its unrelenting blast beats, frantic guitar riffs and chaotic, shrieking vocals.

Passion clocks in at a blistering 36 minutes which seems kind of short, but I think you would probably need to check into a mental asylum if it went any longer.  From the outset you will notice the direct similarities to bands like Aborym, which makes sense since Atila Csihar has lent his vocal talents to the band in the past and of course comparisons can be drawn to the mighty Emperor.  At times you will notice in V.I.T.R.I.O.L’s vocal delivery, a style that harkens back to a young lad by the name of Garm who sang those memorable, operatic masterpieces in Arcturus.  This is abundantly evident on the track “Le Diabolique Est L’ami D Simple” and “Paragon Pariah”.

If you are a fan of Anaal Nathrakh I can almost guarantee that you will enjoy this album.  The only issues that I encountered were at times the vocals became almost too overpowering or annoying, but I don’t think that it takes away from the overall atmosphere of the album.  While it seems that the arrangements were carefully constructed, the album has a tendency to run together at times and make some sections bleed into one another, but once again just a minor bump in the road.   One only need to listen to the breakdown section of “Ashes Screaming Silence” to know that these guys mean business and they have the chops to back it up.

In closing, don’t be afraid to pop Passion in to your CD player and enjoy, but don’t be surprised when your ears start bleeding and your face melts onto the floor; cause if it doesn’t then these guys are just going to have to try harder on their next release.

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