The back and forth of Propagandhi during “A Speculative Fiction” really shows a maturation of two distinct styles of music; an emotive type of rock and the straight-forward type of rock. These styles are deftly maneuvered into a cohesive sound by Glen’s voice, and “A Speculative Fiction” is a track that has a classic, Bad Religion type of sound while still showing some of the metal/punk fusion that catapulted Sum41…
Different blips forcing their way from the periphery to the mainline of things, The Prodigy are back with their “Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned”. The global flow of “Spitfire” comes through with the middle-Eastern sound of the female backing vocals, and the male presence in the track is reminiscent of Zach from Rage Against The Machine. Continuing the same general sound that as found in “Spitfire”, “Girls” doesn’t honestly contribute much…
Sam Sneed may just be one of the forces in rap music that has been slept on over the course of the last few decades. On “Street Scholars”, Sneed looks to come out from behind the curtain. Despite bringing out the big guns on “U Better Recognize”, Sneed’s goal with “Street Scholars” is to give some up and coming rappers, R&B artists, and other musicians a chance to shine. What…
Primal Scream always surprises me. When I last heard them, they were doing an electronic type of thing (and I think that was about 2000). This time, the band has gotten onto the retro rock bandwagon and ion “Country Girl”, have made a track that even The Rolling Stones would be proud of. This retro style presents itself again during “Nitty Gritty”, and Primal Scream seems to revel in this…
Spike has a definite nineties sound to start out “There’s No Sound In Flutes”. However, the disc starts off with “I Know Everything”, a track that has the arrangements struggling against the vocals for dominance. The instrumental interlude during the track is also something that seems out of lplace during the track, especially when Priggen’s vocals are so full of humanity where the interlude sounds forced or downright cold. Either…
The Prids start out “Until The World Is Beautiful” with a drum beat that would confuse anyone into believing that The Prids are a punk rock band. What ultimately comes from this drumming is a subtle set of vocals that make themselves quickly into something that feels like an early Joy Division track than anything else. “The Glow” is this opening track, and while the guitars do not do much…
It is always so hard to give band s a good review when all they send you is two or three songs. This is what Pretty Flowers does on this EP, so any gaps in my opinion on the band can only be corrected by a longer disc. Saying that, their self-titled EP starts out with “Riot”, a track that is led by a very distorted guitar line. There seems…
Giorgio Pretti is a more sincere brand of shrill guitar work in the vein of style like Santana. Why I say “more sincere” is the fact that Giorgio does the vocals and guitar most of the time, rather than the strictly narrow, guitar-only sound of Santana. Pretti is able to take changes in stride much more successfully than Santana; each track on “Cuidado Mano” does not need the same guitar…
Hey, Victory has a band that isn’t trying to cash in on the emo sound? And Premonitions of War sounds like the old Victory bands, what about that? Utterly brutal guitars mix in with break-neck drumming and cookie monster vocals to create a mishmash of metal, hardcore, and heavy metal. Each song starts and stops before one can actually realize whats happening. The crew in Premonitions of War blast through…
“Another’s World” is a pop track in the same vein as Kelly Clarkson and of the other singers (Sinead O’Connor, Natalie Merchant), and shows Preeta as completely capable of wowing audiences by the barrelful. Preeta really seems to have control of “In This Moment” as the first three tracks all have a runtime of one second of each other (two tracks at 3:42 and one at 3:43). The songs are…
Laura Roppe is a performer that defies convention. Where it is easy to provide broad comparisons to artists or other influences for many discs, I found myself sitting down and really focusing in to what she attempts to do on “I’m Still Here”. The album begins with “Bail Yourself Out” an effort that blends together country, gospel, rockabilly, and soul into a catchy and splashy introduction to Roppe. Continuing to…
“Chasing Trains” is the first track on Dana and Lauren’s latest release, a 4-track EP that touches upon a number of distinct and unique styles, sounds, and approaches. This track will immediately touch listeners for a variety of reasons, key of which has to be the utterly compelling vocal harmonies present. Couple these harmonies with a bluegrass-heavy set of arrangements, and what results is the duo’s first single-worthy track. Where…
Daniel Powter plays a very free and open style of pop rock that will fit well alongside groups like Maroon 5 and John Maher. The first track, “Song 6” shows that Powter is immediately marketable for any type of pop radio play. All of the songs on this self-titled disc are within a minute of each other in length, meaning that Powter has found a formula to drive home during…
It has been a few years since we last heard from Powerman 5000, so it should not be that amazing that the band has adopted a slightly different sound for “Destroy What You Enjoy”. Where the first major album used more of a nu-metal sound to get over with the fans, when the band starts “Destroy What You Enjoy”, there is a much more timeless appreciation for hard rock and…
To be honest, the introduction to this record scared me. I thought I was getting into a stodgy jazz record, and then “Matching Luggage” kicks in with a rock meets punk type of hard-hitting sound. The inclusion of horns towards the ending of the track brings Power Lloyd back into the heyday of third-wave ska and puts them into a pantheon which includes bands like the Mighty Mighty Bosstones and…
While familiarizing oneself with Heliocentric (from April, 2010) would be the best course of action, I am glad to report that the learning curve on Anthropocentric does not require familiarization with Heliocentric. Understanding the overall themes and genre approaches taken by the band on the earlier album would be great, but when the titular opening begins, listeners are brought to an entirely new space.
“Perfect” starts out Potty Mouth Society’s album, and the track really recalls both Screeching Weasel and The Pissants. The recording is not as perfect as the former, but there is no lack of intensity in each of Potty Mouth Society’s track. With tracks that average between one and two minutes, an individual cannot get bored with Potty Mouth Society, especially when tracks like “Day Late” look back to the earliest…
The aloof look of Potter on the cover of this disc does not allow for easy assumption of what exactly will hit listeners once this album start. This lack of information is only continued during the opening strains of “Walk Away”, a track that ultimately brings Potter’s style of pop and rock to listeners’ ears. This disc is three years old, and seems to show that age in each of…
I think that The Post Office Gals have a lot in common with The Men’s Recovery Project in that there are so many different things happening in each track on “Esbeohdes”. This means that eighties rock (Robert Palmer) mixes with noise, thrash, electro-punk and dance to make something that is completely new to virgin ears. The first real foray into this type of sound happens with “I Wanna See You…
The Positions – Bliss! / 2005 Self / 12 Tracks / http://www.the-positions.com / Reviewed 12 November 2006 “Bliss!” begins with a style of music that would be much more fitting in the easy listening early seventies. The present of horns and ample bass with a cute voice during “Someday” firmly ensconces The Positions into this brand of music. The first track is something that is very sedate, but has a…