While the first TMBG album certainly sounds primitive compared to where they’d end up, there are still plenty of their hallmarks present even with this early song. They were capable of writing catchy tunes from the beginning, they had the clever lyrics, and the charm was certianly present. The first album has too many incidents of wackiness, too many throwaways to be really great, but there are some fine tunes on it.
[Read More]Helmet’s debut album on Amphetamine Reptile Records was a savage and self-assured record, and they backed it up by touring heavily and blowing people away. Then, Nirvana blew up huge and the major labels started looking for heavy rock acts to sign to satisfy a market suddenly hungry for them. Every single one of them landed on Helmet, and a ferocious bidding war erupted. Interscope were the winners, signing Helmet to a million dollar deal and sending them into the studio. As a teaser, they released a CD single with three of the songs from the upcoming album (including this one) along with one live track, and I got to see what Helmet would sound like with serious dollars behind them. The answer? Helmet!
[Read More]Hey, a quick note here before we get to the main act - we went all of November with a post every single day! NOT BAD
One of my favorite Nickel Creek songs, with the acid lyrics really carrying things, and of course the lovely harmonies are as fun as always. One of the things that I really like about Nickel Creek is how percussive the playing is, so you don’t even really notice that there’s no drums.
[Read More]Czarface is Inspectah Deck, 7L, and Esoteric, making the sort of superhero/villain inspired hip-hop that MF Doom and Ghostface used to make. So, of course, they have teamed up with both Doom and Ghostface, which makes all the sense in the world. Ghostface managed to outshine the other folks on this album, but it’s still kind of a fun romp.
The Olympians are a Daptone act featuring a remixed set of the same kind of usual suspects, with members of the Dap-Kings and Menahan Street Band, among others. They’ve put out just one album thus far, and it’s a fine slab of instrumental soul, if not at all groundbreaking. If you need more of that Daptone sound, you can certainly do a lot worse.
[Read More]Quelle Chris has been on quite a tear. 2018’s collaboration with Jean Grae, Everything’s Fine, was one of the best rap records of that year. 2019? Guns was again one of the best. 2020 has seen him return to collaborating with Chris Keys, producing Innocent Country 2, another excellent record, this one featuring plenty of jazzy beats. This song will give you a taste of the beats on the record, but you’ll have to wait until some future date to hear Quelle Chris.
[Read More]There are some things I miss from physical media. Browsing through music stores, looking at cover art, reading through booklets for liner notes and credits, all that stuff was fun. But it’s nice not having to shuffle around CDs, it’s nice not to have to lug stuff around when I want to listen to something different, and it’s really, really nice not to have to deal with stupid hidden tracks.
[Read More]From the first Big Black release, Lungs (later collected on The Hammer Party), this was all done entirely by Steve Albini. After this EP, Albini was able to put together an actual band, and the Big Black sound would come together. Despite that, you can still hear Albini’s approach developing on these songs, which read almost New Wave at times.
Hell yeah!
[Read More]Imagine having the confidence to open an album this way. A distant, chilly vibe, acutal ocean noises, a complete change a minute in in both mood and sound, no vocals until the last five seconds. Just bonkers. It was a true declaration of intent, though, as the whole album basically fulfilled the promise of this opening track.
One of the fun things about The Ugly Organ, if “fun” is the right word, is that they made great use of the cello in order to really fill out the sounds on the record. Tim Kasher’s songs are very good, as always, and the album is one of my favorites of theirs.
[Read More]I always enjoy the manic stuff when they really roll it out. A nice performance from Marty Beller on the drums here.
DJ Muggs was always the best part of Cypress Hill, and it’s nice to hear him working with Roc Marciano on Kaos, which is a solid pairing. Marciano does good work, and Muggs rolls out a bunch of his signature claustrophobic sounds on the album.
[Read More]Badmotorfinger was the big leap forward for Soundgarden, where they married the murky hard rock homage of their early stuff to clean enough productions and songs to really appeal to a broader audience. And, carried forward by the contemporaneous releases of Nevermind and Ten, that broader audience found them. Soundgarden had always had potential to be a big band, as the core of that Sabbath/Zeppelin sound had a built-in appeal to a bunch of folks, and they would be one of the breakout acts of the grunge scene.
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