Autolux, “Becker”

Hm. What is this? I like it! I don’t remember buying it, that’s all. I suspect I picked it up in a sweep of year end lists and then forgot about it. It’s good! Looks like there’s a connection with Failure here, but I don’t know if that’s why I got it. Anyway, enjoy!

Krallice, “Set”

This is from Krallice’s 2020 release Mass Cathexis. Cathexis is one of those words that must disproportionately appear in a metal context - it sounds badass and nobody knows what it means. I mean, I’ve never seen it outside of a metal context! But I must be misremembering things, it looks like only three albums with the word in it, and 12 songs, none of which I’m familiar with other than this album.

The Clash, “I Fought The Law”

The US release of The Clash had a different track listing than the original release, swapping in some songs from UK singles onto the album in place of some of the weaker tunes. Overall, it’s probably a better version of the record, with “I Fought The Law” being one of the additions to the record.

Gas Huffer, “The Rest of Us”

Gas Huffer spent three albums in the majors…well, the high minors, with albums out on Epitaph. But then they went back to their roots: Estrus Records, Jack Endino on the boards, and back to wall-to-wall garage rock. The return to their basics suited them well, it’s a strong record, although I suppose nobody really listened to it. I guess it’s relative: their last Epitaph record has 25 ratings on Rate Your Music, compared to 7 for this album. So, nobody really listened to either of them. It’s a shame, Gas Huffer was good!

Einstürzende Neubauten, “Stella Maris”

Ende Neu felt like a bit of a reset for the band, which makes some sense after one of the founding members departed. There’s a lot more things on here that you’d characterize as songs, even nice ones. That’s not to say that it’s conventional, just that the surface of it is pretty conventional. But as always, Neubauten is in the details, and it’s a good album after you dig in, although they’d get more comfortable in this new format on subsequent records.

Big Audio Dynamite II, “The Globe”

Well, this is quite a time capsule, isn’t it? This whole early 90s thing of guitar dance music really didn’t age especially well, although at this point, there’s a certain goofy try-hard charm to this, with all the little samples and bits floating in and out.

Swallowed, “Black Phlegm”

Silly Swallowed. Black is for bile, not for phlegm! That’s colorless! Metal bands should really know medieval medicine better than this.

The Roots, “The Show”

While I really like their later work, Rising Down is probably the last record I consider a truly great Roots record. It’s hard to say it’s their best, given how much I love Things Fall Apart and Game Theory (and Phrenology), but if it’s not quite there, it’s very, very close. It’s super focused and the band knows exactly what they’re doing. It feels like it didn’t get a ton of attention, but it should have, it’s awesome.

The Afghan Whigs, “The Spell”

After a sixteen year hiatus, the Afghan Whigs got back together, meaning Greg Dulli decided to start recording music under that moniker. I think there are some shared folks with 1965 besides him, hard to tell from Discogs. Anyway, the music post-hiatus seems like it continues on a straight line from where they left off, but as if they kept making albums in the meantime. If that makes sense? That is, if there were four albums missing in-between and they kept evolving in the same direction, you’d end up where they are now.

Jawbox, “Static”

With Novelty, Jawbox added a second guitarist to the lineup and the fuller sound really brought them to another level. While I like Grippe, this is the album where Jawbox became Jawbox. “Static” is one of my favorite songs on the album, with my fondness bolstered by the fun novelty 7" they put out as a split with Tar, where each band covered the other band’s song named “Static”.

Floor, “Downed Star”

There’s a longing feel to a lot of Floor, an almost wistful tint to the vocal style. When it’s married to the thrumming music, it’s a fun combination.

Beastie Boys, “5-Piece Chicken Dinner”

I love Paul’s Boutique, but this is just a goof out-of-context. OK, it’s a goof in-context also, but it makes sense with the album sequence.

Pyrrhon, “Goat Mockery Ritual”

Oh hell yeah. One of my favorite metal bands, Pyrrhon takes death metal and adds so much dissonance and spastic experimentation that it can sometimes seem overwhelming. I think at some point, it’s gone so far that my expectations are just shot. I don’t know what’s coming next, so I can just relax and revel in the twitchy glory of this whole thing. It’s hard to pick a favorite album from them, you can’t go wrong with any of the three most recent LPs.

Non Phixion, “Legacy”

This is from the comp Fat Beats Compilation, Volume 1, a nice release from 2001 of a bunch of cats going mostly pretty old-school. Yes, there are multiple DJ Premier tracks on the comp. It’s a fun record, worth just settling back and nodding your head along to.

Death Cab For Cutie, “Grapevine Fires”

As always, I can’t really tell Death Cab records apart, other than Transatlanticism. This is not that record, so I dunno, it’s from Photos About Narrow Voting Plans or whatever. It’s fine, I enjoy this just fine! I’m just going to forget it shortly. This is probably a me problem.

The Mooney Suzuki, “Oh Sweet Susanna”

Sometimes, we get a band on here that I just want to describe as “rock”. Just rock. This is a rock band, playing a rock song. Rock. You want rock? Have rock.

Yautja, “A Killing Joke”

Yautja is most frequently described as a combination of sludge and grindcore, which are two genres that don’t sit very naturally together in my head. There’s a monomaniacal relentlessness to grindcore, a commitment to aggression above all else, that doesn’t marry to sludge’s necessity for timing being key and the flexibility to stretch or compress things. But Yautja makes it work, and it’s a unique sound they’ve assembled. This is from last year’s The Lurch, and I recommend it.