The Velvet Teen – No Star

Buy Here (digital)

(hard copy)

They dropped the electronics for the strings and heads that they know well. Strong driving pace stands tall in a dark room with lots of life to give. An LP with this bite will bring much blood to a stage waiting to be killed with the axes of hungry locals. I see little to cry about and see more tight drums fills with monster bass pulling slashed vocals of time and love with distorted guitar bringing more.

Times are what they will and times were not like they were when they made The Velvet Teens breakout album Elysium. Today in a fast and recessed lives of cheap beer and silent cars that still run on oil for no reason this EP says nothing about that and kicks hard. I recommend this album and recommended getting on a bike every once in a while.

http://thevelvetteen.org/

9/10 Replays

Gang Gang Dance – Saint Dymphna

Release Date – October 21, 2008

Label – THE SOCIAL REGISTRY

Like the title of the album a Saint of the mentally unstable this albums takes many forms of house, psychedelic, rock, electronic, tribal, Eastern Indian, drum circle and atmospheric prettiness that gets a little strong at parts. A New York trend band Gang Gang Dance is not really like anything I have heard before. Female vocals singing reverb shrieks and moans layered with likewise lead guitars that sound like they were made with a computer but are not. Drums are a super strong beat that make take house to the indie rock stage and tribe out toward a hippy communion where they dance in circles with their heads down and hands raised. If I were to close my eyes and imagine what I’m doing during the listen I would be in a soft and polite sand storm swirling me around ever so gently taking me to a foreign land. Don’t worry scenesters you can like this, it’s skinny jeans approved. Strange and welcoming, strong and soft, breaking old rules and pulsing to a different heart beat.

Who needs drugs when we have music like this?

I would also recommend Gang Gang Dances prior album for more of the same great oddness with more of an older stronger beat to it.

9/10 Replays

At the ear Kisses sounds like it was made on the other side of the world with accents and government subsidies but not with this crew. Kisses are from Los Angeles a small town in the middle of nowhere surrounded by very little popular culture. I am surprised that this pop sound is from such an anti-commercial population. Almost 80′s almost 70′s disco and pop music with tight melodies, beach and sport car sunglasses provided or maybe more likely poolside with sun bleached towels and coco oil smell in the air. With polite guitars, simple bass lines and nice sharp keys play this right to the soft-rock dance floor. I think this album has a great playback ratio, if you can handle fake European accents from a California bedroom just outside the suburbs. Why they do this I’m not sure?? But it works and that is what matters in the big picture. From L.A. I guess I would expect some fake something or another. It’s worth a listen or two or ten.

6/10 Replays

http://blowkisses.info/

Release date – May 7, 2010

Ringing of the bell for the children to come in from the cold is how Tickling the Tail of the Tiger starts and the eeriness of that feeling does not stop till the end. With piano and drums as the basis, large droning vocals and Kid A styled beats to formulate a rich landscape of music that is a much different sound from Santa Rosa, California. The album has a way of almost making nine tracks into one and I think I get lost in the music because the albums seems to be over before I even know it. Piano melodies are really pleasant over the unholy beats that make each song, a real drum kit is a nice and refreshing part of Goodriddlers. Nothing too over the top and nothing boring here, it fits into the album sleeve just right.

9/10 Replays

myspace goodriddler

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tonegazer.com Goodriddler article

Triclops! – Helpers On The Other Side

Triclops! (not the action figure from Masters of the Universe)

Last year I got the chance to see these guys at my local record store and I was really impressed. High energy and a full force sound that made my eyes dilate in happiness as the loud sound filled my head. Johnny flings himself around the stage and sings with his head pointing straight towards the sky as to yell to the ancients gods of rock and roll and starring at his suspecting onlookers breathing it all in. I had not seen such wonderful antics from a singer since Scott Weiland from S.T.P looked like the devil at the Download Festival many years ago. Fun Psychedelic prog punk that once mostly known as Victims Family is in full effect streaming lasers into the brain scrambling it to a nice consistency of cream corn. This post-punk music but not the type that’s in the post-punk genre bin. Buy this album to rock out like there was a post apocalyptic demon hunt happening in your town and all you could do was think about your life’s path and how its going to end in a lava death scorch. It runs, it thumps and keeps the brain a stirring.  This is only a six song LP but like a ten track albums with three-minute song the Helpers On The Other Side has that epic feel and does not make me yawn. The bass is never-ending it’s dragon slayer disease on the onlookers of the ravaged town of the mighty Triclops!

8.5/10 Replays

http://triclopsband.com/

http://www.myspace.com/triclopsband

An article on music and the funding of popular music with tax money.

Wouldn’t it be great of your local band was given $10,000 to record an album? Well, it happens with bands from Sweden and Canada. Music is a big part of a country’s culture, it brings recognition and money and in many cases these musicians could not afford to create the art we enjoy on a daily basis.

The Tough Alliance – The New School

Release date: 2005

Listening to these young anthems for the umpteenth time I remember two years ago when I was listening to this album everyday and loud. At first this band was at the most feeling like these two guys don’t know much about music. Most of the Tough Alliances’ songs on The New School are simple pop songs with low-income sync beats and lame or corny lyrics that are sung in an annoying tone. These facts are almost true, but if I look at the spirit of the music, it’s a refreshing re-look at how life should be lived. Positive and lively with less care about what others think, keep on doing your thing and you are bad ass. And if you look at the lyrical content of what they are writing about it’s a pretty awesome little package.

A Lot of the music that passes my path is about the darkness of humanity and how love has not found them or something of that nature. Unless it’s about partying and then don’t forget to pop the crisp. But The Tough Alliance has a different look at things and seems to want to look in a less popular, more adult attitude but young at heart. This is funny, an almost childish sounding group singing about productive adult content (but not quite).

The New School is their first L.P. put  out in 2005 and re-released in 2008, it’s not a cleanly produced and has a less house and more pop electronic style of format then their later albums. They seem to shout the lyrics out at you and have basic rhythms running along the vocals while keyboards and fake horns blare. Not something to fall asleep but more for the morning drive or bike ride. Nice funk break downs and hip-styled spirit from these khakied pants and polo shirt wearing childhood friends.

The Tough Alliance is an electronic/pop/balearic group of two guys from Gothenburg, Sweden doing what they want. They run the Sincerely Yours music label and if you go see them live they would only be equipped with an ipod, a projector and themselves on stage. They make no apologizes for this kind of artistry. “It’s really hard work not to play along, but you will never be able to find real joy if you do. The Tough Alliance is about doing what you can to escape that spectacle and find real life, it’s creating a context where you’re totally free and comfortable, even if it takes a lifetime.” Says, Eric Berglund of TTA. This is what I see makes the group special and if you listen to their stuff enough it will strangely expand your ideas of what they are about.

You are probably wondering why I gave this album a 9 when I said some bad things about this album? It’s because if you have little to say about something maybe it’s not worth talking about.

9/10 Replays

http://www.thetoughalliance.com/

http://www.sincerelyyours.se/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tough_Alliance

Rogue Wave – Permalight

Release date – March 2, 2010

Brushfire Records

I happen to be a big fan of Rogue Wave, listening to all of their albums over the past couple of years. These albums have been standards in my cd case in the car and the albums are easily re-playable as the tracks go from 10 or 11 back to 1 in my single disc cd player with a slight scratching sound as the cd reader goes back to the start. Zach Rogues soft voice is high-pitched and reverbed slightly with the mainly acoustic guitar lead band. Permalight is Rogue Waves most optimistic and cheery album to date. Permalight has a more electronic kick to it with lots of the songs starting with an upbeat groove going into the song that was not as much in their on previous albums. My first listen was a little disconcerting because I did not want more computer effects on a Rogue Wave album. But like any change I slowly adjust and the album and enjoy it just as much, but not more. I think the songs with less fluff have a greater impact and as I look back on my favorite Rogue Wave songs the slow sad polite songs have a larger replay number. I might give this album a lower rating but the change in attitude toward something more sunny is important to me, now keep in mind not all these songs are all smiles but compared earlier albums it’s much happier and has a slight grown up tone to it.  Permalight does what it was meant to do which is bring the soft indie rock rain from the speakers. I hope to see these guys live this year hopefully from the great city of Oakland where they are from.

7.8/10 Replays

http://www.roguewavemusic.com/

http://www.myspace.com/roguewave

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_Wave_%28band%29

Efterklang – Magic Chairs

Modern classical movements are trying to crawl out of the underground all the time with strings a bowed and sheet music in hand these romantic styled are everywhere if you look for them. Efterklang is danish for remembrance, this is their third album and for sure their most indie rock of the three.  I am a sucker for the emotional whoooooo’s of an accented shy man in his 30′s singing about life with a choral group behind him. Efterklang has the styles of Sigur Ros, Radiohead, Broken Social Scene, David Bowie or Sting vocals at times and modern classical music with an orchestrated sound with strings, trumpets, piano, and drums never really overwhelming me with an overdose of symphonic explosions that many other groups feel they have to do. Using this style can have such an effect that takes only a few times listening to have a full idea of this band. Guitar is hanging around and lead singers voice has his Danish language accent a shadow as he sings in  mostly about generalized love. The bad, the good come together on this subject, background singers male and female singers add the layers, clapping at times. The mood of this album is nice and takes me places without getting out the dance shoes. It’s nice and sleek, Forgot it in people by Broken social Scene is almost like the granddaddy of this album. With that magical style and classical spaceships dragging this album into the outer universe always on a steady course for a cold moon in the orbit of a far off planet. While the team leaders have a full smile on their face confident they will land safely on the surface to conquer a rich land full of life ready for exploring.

7.5/10 Replays

http://www.efterklang.net/

http://www.myspace.com/efterklang

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efterklang

The Radio Dept – Clinging To A Scheme

Label: Labrador Records

This sounds like the weather outside my house on a really windy day. Drifts of cold rhythms over long-winded singing . I know the climate my town is not cold, it’s not even close to cold compared to some places during the winter. But I still understand the bite of this album and what happens to a space being overtaken by it. The beginning of song two says a lot about whats up with the anarchist inside of me and others. This album has a nod to the 80′s with other decades going on. I don’t know much of what he’s saying nor do I need to know, but what I do get is an upbeat way of thinking while the rest, meaning people are getting this man down. While he speaks to his lover about why she or he needs to stay with him and be happy. Unlike The Radio Dept. earlier albums of shoegaze. Simple drum machines with acoustic guitar make the is album a different approach for these guys. I do like this albums mellowness, it’s not electronic and it’s not rock. Sadness could be heard in this album but the lyrics are not as sad as the tune and this brings new meaning. I’m not saying this album is the upbeat inspiration someone should listen to when already down but the mood is nice. Soft air comes out of his mouth under awesome bossa nova drum machines, maracas shakers, sync tones and hip-hop  inspired grooves. Dancing to this album could strangely work without being overwhelming. My favorite track has a sound bite from a graffiti artist sounding like from New York and he states: It’s for us, I don’t care about anyone else. Make what you want and forget about the those who nasty things. This is how hip-hop has infiltrated the north.

7.2/10 Replays

http://theradiodept.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Radio_Dept.

http://www.myspace.com/officialradiodept