In the early ’00s, as the new millennium dawned ugly and crazy, indie rock threw a dance party. The music was bleak and nervous and twitchy — exactly what the world needed, or at least deserved.
Taking inspiration from Joy Division and Gang of Four, defunct British acts no one had thought about 20 years, a [...]
July 27, 2010 at 9:00 am | Share |
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Plenty of bands take forever to fuss over new material. The Hold Steady is not one of them.
The band Tuesday releases “Heaven is Whenever” (Vagrant), its fifth studio album and sixth full-length overall since 2004 — an impressive pace, especially given how much time the Brooklyn group spends on tour.
“One thing that’s really helped is [...]
May 3, 2010 at 8:00 am | Share |
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Becky Black and Maya Miller aren’t messing around.
The Vancouver duo, known as the Pack a.d., plays blues-laced garage rock with ferocious abandon, and they do it a lot: Black and Maya played 157 shows in 2009. Naturally, all that rocking out has molded them into a super-tight unit, and it shows on “We Kill Computers,” [...]
April 28, 2010 at 8:34 am | Share |
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Jesse Malin likes to talk about “positive mental attitude,” the words behind the “PMA” decals on his trusty black Les Paul. It’s a motto that’s served him well — particularly over the last couple of years.
Following the release of his third album, 2007’s “Glitter in the Gutter,” the New York City singer-songwriter found himself broke, [...]
April 26, 2010 at 8:00 am | Share |
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Glen Pine joined the Slackers in 1997, just after the New York City band released its sophomore effort, “Redlight.” The album marked a major step forward, its mix of ska, reggae, rocksteady, dub, soul, and ’50s rock ‘n’ roll prefacing the string of smart, genre-defying releases that has followed. More than [...]
April 21, 2010 at 10:53 am | Share |
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After Mantler released “Landau” in 2004, mastermind Chris A. Cummings figured it would take three years to make the next record. It actually took six, in part because he was in no hurry.
“It ended up being really exhausting, getting it out on a deadline, so I decided that when the time came to record my [...]
April 12, 2010 at 8:00 am | Share |
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The Drive-By Truckers like to work ahead: the Southern rockers have usually finished making the album after the current album by the time the current album comes out. For example: The band this week released its latest, “The Big To-Do” (ATO), and already has the next record in the can ready for release later this [...]
March 17, 2010 at 7:30 am | Share |
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After releasing “Living With the Living” in 2007, Ted Leo & the Pharmacists got off to a fast start on the follow-up. It also proved to be a false start.
Recording sessions went nowhere, prompting the band to take a year-long break from the studio — just in time to spend the summer opening for Pearl [...]
March 10, 2010 at 10:18 am | Share |
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The first album by Retribution Gospel Choir came together in a hurry in 2008, but Alan Sparhawk’s Low side project took its time honing songs for the follow-up.
“The first record was pretty early in the band and we were still trying to figure out what was going on,” he tells Listen, Dammit. “This time we [...]
January 26, 2010 at 8:30 am | Share |
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Perhaps by instinct, children of ’80s suburbia will be drawn to the music of Neon Indian.
Armed with vintage synths and arcane samples, group mastermind Alan Palomo writes songs reminiscent of, among other things, Wham hits, Sega soundtracks and Cameo-era funk jams. Listening to Neon Indian’s debut, “Psychic Chasms” (Lefse), is like sleeping over your at [...]
November 12, 2009 at 8:00 am | Share |
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