The Wake

Pokémon—the cultural zeitgeist over a decade long and going just as strong—continues to run wild on the wallets of parents, kids, teens and twenty-somethings, having just come out with Pokémon Heart Gold and Soul Silver but a few short weeks ago. Although this latest batch is just a remake of a previous round of Game Boy games, the quest to catch ‘em all hasn’t been as fun, or as addicting, for quite some time (yes, even to college kids who wax nostalgic about playing the original games when they were little children).

Both Heart Gold and Soul Silver (previously the second-generation Pokémon Gold and Silver games on the Game Boy) have been graphically updated, maxing out the 2.5D capabilities and the full color pixilation the Nintendo DS has to offer. The gameplay is, of course, …

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If Indie Rock’s folk wing has any sort cardinal sin it would be the often saccharine level of twee-ness that seems to saturate the works of artists that are not wary of its toxicity after prolonged exposure. Anders Mattson, whose alias was originally designed to aid with a common mis-pronouncement of his name, abandoned his strict classical training on the viola during his teenage years in favor of the guitar and has found his way back to his native instrument in a similar fashion to Andrew Bird or Sufjan Stevens. Mattson’s classical training shines through in the beautiful, delicate string arrangements on Nodes of Overtones, but unfortunately that’s where the similarities between him and his colleagues stops.

Tracks like “How We’ve Grown” and “Pomegranate” start quite pleasantly, with a catchy viola …

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“In the Air Tonight” – Phil Collins
This is the obvious choice. It’s been popularized now as Mike Tyson’s “favorite part” of the song in “The Hangover,” but long before anybody had ever even heard of Bradley Cooper, the drum fill in this song around 3:40 had me, and everyone else in the world, waiting on the edge of their driver’s seat in anticipation and beating the shit out of their steering wheels when this totally rad moment finally arrived.

For an added bonus, look up “In the Air Tonight Live” (posted by Sportadic22) on YouTube and watch the ever-creepy Phil Collins milk the moment for all it’s worth in front of thousands of people.

“Coffee” – Aesop Rock (feat. John Darnielle)
The first time I read the track listing for this song I did a double-take. …

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There is this idea that filesharing is bad for bands, which comes from a simple logical fallacy that hinges on the misguided notion that if free downloads were not available, the downloader would instead purchase the album. In reality, in most cases of illegal music downloading, the listener would not buy the album if he couldn’t download it, he would simply not listen to it at all. As a person who spends quite a bit of money supporting struggling underground bands, I can say with absolute certainty that in my case, without illegal downloads not a cent of that money would’ve been spent, because without filesharing I would never have had any idea who any of those bands were.

Illegal filesharing affords curious listeners an immense freedom to discover new bands: the whole risk/reward equation regarding …

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The Stooges - The Stooges

The first song on The Stooges is called “1969,” and its abrasive, confrontational punk spirit and sound immediately makes it clear that The Stooges are not mourning the end of the 60s. One pictures singer Iggy Pop stumbling through hippie havens, scowling and swearing, subconsciously building the momentum that would explode onto his band’s first record. This was a new kind of rebellion.

Drawing from The Troggs and The Rolling Stones, The Stooges presented a concise, brawny strain of rock that bands have been attempting to imitate ever since. Ron Asheton’s guitar switches from crisp, simple riffs to squealing, screeching, brilliantly discordant solos. Not to be outdone, Iggy Pop announces his arrival by the end of the contemptuous, swaggering first verse of “1969” and needs only the …

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The sound is the most immediately striking thing about Cloudkicker’s new EP: they’ve found the perfect production style for this sort of music. The record’s sound is crisp, full, huge, and dynamic. But a great sound is nothing without good riffs, and Cloudkicker’s production is suited equally well to the band’s ethereally epic style and their stern mathematical riffing. It would be hard to find a bad riff on any of these three songs: the licks follow smoothly one after the other with every section pulling its own weight.

Cloudkicker is a four-piece instro/prog/metal-ish band from Britain, and they’ve put out a slew of EPs in the last few years that are reminiscent of what Pelican could do if they sacked their drummer. Their songs move seamlessly back and forth between sections of gigantic layered feel-good …

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Indie Rock’s hype-to-backlash machine has such an impressively quick turnaround that it’s a wonder Palm Beach, Florida’s native sons Surfer Blood even had a chance to release their debut record. The band quickly gained critical acclaim following an impressive showing at this year’s CMJ festival with a raw, muscular and distinctly noir-ish take on ‘90s indie power pop. Comparisons to Weezer trail the band, but Astro Coast contains so much more than a retread of the Blue Album’s tropes. John Paul Pitts, the band’s singer-guitarist-mastermind has crafted an enduring classic with this record, one of those ten-song shitkickers that’s made to roll on repeat in car stereos at high volume. The guitars land with a propulsive thump on the album’s opener “Floating Vibes” and then proceed to weave delicate little melodies around Pitt’s reverb-soaked …

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What does it mean for young people to make old-time music? This question is unavoidable in a discussion of an album like this one, but I don’t have a clear answer. Is it dishonest for educated young people to sing songs about working all day and not being able to read? Is it objectionable to be nostalgic for an idealized period of time in which you never lived, or is that form of escapism harmless? Is this music aesthetically meaningful or is it just kitsch? All of these issues come to the foreground during “Hit ‘Em Up Style,” an old-fashioned cover of a one-hit trash song from 2001. The Drops have arranged the song for fiddle, banjo and beatbox, creating what could either be seen as a fusion of old and new styles or a …

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For the purpose of discussing music, we almost prefer an average musical experience to a great one because of what happens when something is so great: there’s nothing to be said. If we heard some average music, we might have criticized which of its flaws stuck with us the most. We may each have different flaws to note or perhaps one of us would have found it unremarkable enough to nod ‘yes’ through the others’ critique and we would soon be discussing other concerns that affect us more deeply.

But when music is truly great, we are left still in our words. We could talk about, but it would amount to simple praises that would do no respect to the music. So why is it so difficult to discuss great music? It is not, after …

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Phantogram

This duo has been garnering a tremendous amount of buzz around the blog circuit, gaining accolades for their infusion of standard hip-hop beats and the angelic croon of lead singer Sarah Barthel. If you were in a Starbucks within the past month, they were the download of the week, they just signed to the esteemed labels, Barsuk and Ghostly International (Ra Ra Riot, Menomena, Mates of State, School of Seven Bells), and they’ll be at South by Southwest this March in Austin to support their debut album, “Eyelid Movies,” which has already been designated an NPR focus of the week. They’re from Saratoga Springs, New York, and they recorded their beautifully produced EP in a barn. Radio K is a big fan; they played at our CMJ (College Music Journal) broadcast in New York City …

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Frosted tree tips just outside the city, products of last night’s sleet barrage, greet me on yet another beautiful Minneapolis morning. Except this time, the frozen white fingertips of the tree line, stretching heavenward, are ushering me out of the metropolis and into the great northern realms of the state. Besides being drenched in freezing rain the prior evening, Minneapolis experienced a different blow of the cold kind—another talented young band forced to hang up their hats and call it a day.

The band I’m referring to is a little-known hardcore group called Cowards. Somehow, after witnessing their “last” set at the Beat Coffeehouse and being totally blown out of my gourd by their original brand of prog-infused hardcore punk, I’ve scored a ride up to Duluth with the bassist to check out their true …

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Eric Brew

It may simply be my aversion to any discussion of morality that marks my distaste for The Machinist. It could also be the high hopes I had for its’ seemingly intricate and inquisitive plotline. Even until the end, despite the better part of my ego telling me precisely what the protagonist’s reality was, I refused to accept the obviousness of the resolution. I was set on a conclusion that I still couldn’t decipher—something I was waiting for the film to show me. Instead the film gives an overdone facsimile of the psychology of guilt, one that questions both the continuity of experience and the ability of the mind to harbor illness.

If I were to concern myself primarily with what The Machinist contemplates, in regard to …

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Kel Mitchell

Remember Kel Mitchell? That funny bastard who loved orange soda on all of those Nickelodeon shows in the 90s? “Kenan & Kel”? “All That”? “Good Burger”? What the fuck ever happened to that guy? Answer: He’s gone off the proverbial deep end and has begun a new life of making bizarre YouTube skits. This is genuinely crazy stuff, folks. It’s like he’s been on a different planet for the last ten years and the only thing he brought back with him was a batshit sense of humor. Watch the breakdown commence on his YouTube channel:

http://www.youtube.com/user/mrkelmitchell

What This Is:

I asked as many people as possible to review the same album for this issue. My idea was to showcase the essential and inescapable subjectivity of criticism, and to that end I chose a challenging record: The Purging Trilogy, a two-hour-long avant-guitar album by guitarist Mick Barr. The record is split into three parts: Ixoltion, Sacreth, and Hymns. As I expected, every assertion put forth in one of these reviews is contradicted in another, and above all every reviewer displayed their personal style of criticism.

Pete Noteboom
It’s a massive translucent pirate ship filled with damned souls holding scimitars cutting through the clouds. It’s a gigantic zeppelin exploding in mid-air amid a hail of flaming comets. It’s a young boy watching from the mountains with mouth agape as extraterrestrials decimate his small …

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We probably should’ve seen this coming: Beach House’s musical development has floated along much like one of their songs. Beginning beautifully but a bit obscured by the haze, the band’s intentions cleared up on their second album, Devotion, paralleling the intoxicating, mysterious melodies that gradually seep into their songs. With Teen Dream, the band’s third and latest album, we see this song blossom into a chorus more gorgeous and entrancing than could have been imagined at its humble beginning.

Beach House loses nothing and gains much on Teen Dream, their debut on Sub Pop. Still present are the lush organs that have defined the band, but they’re brighter this time around. Readily identifiable are Victoria Legrand’s thick vocals, but here they sound more confident, with traces of Stevie Nicks wandering in and out. Beach …

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