Nicholas Sparks, who penned the original book that The Last Song was crafted on, is perhaps the best-known author at the current time. In much the same way, Miley Cyrus may just be the most well-known actress at this current moment. It is not surprising then that The Last Song is a title that is truly magnificent, with a storyline that anyone can identify with. The Last Song surrounds a…
New York’s COLIN SCHILLER AND THE REACTIONS celebrate life’s excitement through music, combining catchy, simple rock n ‘roll with serious musicianship. Taking a modern spin on feel-good 80’s-influenced rock, Schiller says, “I want to give the kind of show that I like to see. I want to be entertained, hear catchy melodies and have a smile on my face when I leave a show.” They just released the single and…
German, vegan, and straight-edge, Maroon comes out of the gate (after their minute introductory track, “Catharsis” finishes) furious and full of the Cookie Monster spirit. The double-bass comes out fast and furious on this disc, but seriously, just because you can hit them 200 times in a minute doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to do it. In fact, “The Worlds Havoc” just has Nick’s drums create the same sonic…
Nashville’s Kyle Andrews announces the release of his upcoming KANGAROO EP, out August 31st on Elephant Lady Records. The songwriter has enjoyed a recent abundance of interest and new fans with the placement of his jaunty tune “You Always Make Me Smile” playing an integral part of Holiday Inn’s “Stay You” advertising campaign. Airing heavily on international television and online, there are many different versions of the ad with all…
The opening of “The Hidden One” is something that would confuse listeners, as the track could also portend the opening of “Time Of Your Life (Good Riddance)” by Green Day. However, the country style of Cody Marks comes up heavily soon after this introduction, and “The Hidden One” assumes a style that is not quite unlike that of a blend of Joni Mitchell and Pete Seeger. The overall sound of…
New York City hardcore legends MADBALL have issued an in-studio update, intending to bring fans up to speed on the recording of their upcoming GOOD FIGHT MUSIC release, Empire. The record will hit stores on October 12th, 2010. “The recording process has gone smoothly. Hopefully I won’t screw it up,” jokes MADBALL vocalist Freddy Cricien. “I’m actually going in to track vocals today and I’m looking forward to it. And…
Martin Clancy is a native of Dublin, Ireland who primarily writes and records in the medieval village of Haute De Cagnes, France. He is the first artist signed to New York’s Seaport Music record label. He is the artist in residence for the Seaport Music festivals. Martin DJs these events as part of his collective band gLab (pronounced Gee-Lab). In addition to gLab Martin has a dance outfit called Martin…
Steven Mark comes through with a very poppy style that really looks more towards Sean Lennon than the (comparable) hard rock of the Foo Fighters. The style of “Aloneaphobe” really feels as if Mark walked out of the early seventies, specifically taking equal parts Jimmy Buffet and James Taylor to make a “third wave” of music. While tracks like “Weak” are not the most innovative in terms of arrangement or…
Rusty Willoughby is celebrating the release of his latest full-length, “Cobirds Unite,” featuring Seattle elite such as Rachel Flotard, Barrett Martin, Barb Antonio, Margrethe Bjorklund, Johnny Sangster, Scott Sutherland, Lisa King, and Tillman Herb. A Pacific Northwest songwriting mainstay, Rusty Willoughby has been writing, recording, and performing music since 1982. Largely known for his work with the rock/pop bands Pure Joy, Flop, and Llama, Willoughby¹s mostly lo-key, often lo-fi and…
Body Talk PT 2, the second in a trilogy of albums that Robyn will release this year on Cherrytree Records, is due out on September 7th. “Hang With Me,” the album’s lead single, will be available at all digital retailers on August 17th. The collection will also feature a duet with Snoop Dogg, who delivers what Robyn describes as a “very gangsta” performance on “U Should Know Better.” Just last…
The name might as well be a movie title: Twin Shadow in … Forget. Only it’s not a movie; it’s a panoramic LP that introduces us to the twilight zone tale of George Lewis Jr. The troubled son of a hairdresser and a “teacher who lived many lives” (semi-pro football, massage therapy, film maker and other things we’ll tell you about when you’re older), George was born in the Dominican…
“Jekyll Walks” shows The Mark as an emo band that really lives up to their EP title; the song is construed quite like a sea, in which the music breaks over individuals incessantly, only pulling back with the desire to hit the listener harder with the next wave. This is not necessarily only the emo of bands like Senses Fail, but something that has a larger set of influences than…
Play Ball. Hailed by Sports Illustrated as “a damn good baseball movie” and ranked the #1 sports movie of all time*, Bull Durham hits a new high when it debuts on Blu-ray August 3 from MGM Home Entertainment. Covering all bases with critics, men and women alike, the film about sports and sex from writer/director Ron Shelton (White Men Can’t Jump, Cobb) stars Oscar® winners Kevin Costner (Dances With Wolves,…
I thought that the retro rock of bands like Jet and The Storkes was dead. I was praying and hoping that it was, and then a band like Mardo comes on the scene. Mind you, there have been a lot of bands that have looked back to their rock influences and have created amazing albums; Wolfmother and The Darkness (for their first album at least) are two that come to…
Just in time for Halloween, the highly-anticipated, heart-pounding sequel Mirrors 2 debuts exclusively on Blu-ray and DVD October 19 from Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment. When Max, a recovering addict, takes a job as a nighttime security guard, he begins to see visions of a young mysterious woman in the store’s mirror. The terrifying results push audiences to the edge-of-their-seats in this white-knuckle horror film directed by Spanish filmmaker Victor…
AVAILABLE IN NORTH AMERICA OCTOBER 12th ON SPV/STEAMHAMMER They were the prime mover, they preached back seat education, and together with Alice Cooper they fed Frankenstein….now they are back….meaner, leaner and heavier than ever. ZODIAC MINDWARP & THE LOVE REACTION will enter a new decade of heavy dirty street rock n`roll as they declare “We Are Volsung”. Inspired by the Nordic mythology the album features ten brand-new unadulterated. The album…
What do you get when you mix the political leanings and intelligence of Bad Religion with the super-dramatic vocals of System of a Down, and swaddle it with the vestments of Pennywise and Strike Anywhere? Marathon, of course – their first track “Painting By Numbers” immediately attacks the listener, the government, and anyone else that gets too close. Starting out their second track “I Don’t Have A Dancing Problem” with…
What makes DaVinci so dynamic is that he consistently establishes expectations and consistently breaks them afterward. While The Day The Turf Stood Still’s first single, “What You Finna Do”, painted a picture of gentrification affecting his neighborhood, The Fillmore, DaVinci’s second single, “Ben”, took a look at society’s infatuation with money; all with DaVinci’s block-influenced point of view. With his latest single, “Concrete Jungle Juice” DaVinci again shows off his…
If Sylvester Martinez and Johnson Peterson, aka Yolanda Be Cool, were in the Carpenters, they would be singing “We’ve only just begun.” For though 2009 was a massive year for these two, what with exclusively signing their releases to Ajax’s Sweat It Out label, their bookings to his agency not to mention their original productions and remixes receiving huge support from some of the scene’s biggest players, they are far…
The opening strains of “Breakfast at Ikea” sound like Enigma, or like Tori Amos if ey plugged into an outlet. Soon after, a disaffected set of vocals attempt a blend of The Smiths and Depeche Mode before kicking into a very seventies arrangement. Overall, Map goes through a number of styles in their creation of a Map-specific sound. By crafting this sound at such an early point during “San Francisco…