New Age lady bearing a concoction of world, chant and Joe Satriani that’d probably work as clear-your-head background for ashtanga class if the students were told the lyrics are in Sanskrit (they’re not). Going by Google, Lumari is the only person on earth spreading the “Alawashka” language, billing it as “the mother of all languages,” […]

It’s been an odd year for Metropolis releases, with nearly all of them fitting a pattern of better music being found on their second halves. Eerily enough, this extends to their reissue catalog as well, as seen in Eulogy for The Sick Child, 1999’s EBM clinic from the former DNA. Admittedly, there’s not a lot […]

New soundtrack to a performance-surfing documentary shot in the late 70s. The intro offers speed-drumming fritzed through a phase-shifter, then moves on to your typical (and ironically dated, as of recently) Queens of the Stone Age fuzz with a nod in the general direction of hammock-rock things like Quagmire. “Glitter Pit” is comprised of slapped-together […]

Conjecturally, Photophob are nosing around the underground territory lorded over by Chachi Jones, who specializes in “circuit bending,” a headphone electro technique characterized by slow-paced symphonic dirges splattered with incorrigible, frothing beats and samples that include old Furbys or basically any consumer electronics device that makes odd noises when its components are fritzed. Though nowhere […]

Dreary soccer mom pushes her drearily cherubic daughter’s C&W bullocks in an age of nothing but null-relevance American Idolbots molded from 100% Plastigoop, world reacts with blank, uncomfortable stares. The little brat sings her hookless Trisha Yearwood wannabe-isms with all the passion of a spanked Hansen, taking great pains to avoid straining her precious honky […]

Reissue of the superbly angry 1990 release. The album’s atmospheric intro alone is enough to set it apart from other Sabbath-esque product, but the music is even more of a pleasant surprise, with “Repent” utilizing the wobbly vocal effects of Soundgarden’s “Black Hole Sun” to a better end, opening a wide, deathly aural space which […]

Paul Carr’s sax is a weapon of chill destruction, not too souped-up (there’s no sign that he’s battling for shelf space with fusion proggers) and not too old school either. His new album administers straight-up commuter feel-goodness similar to Sonny Rollins or a more freestyle Ronny Laws. The set boots up with the album’s eponymous […]

An expensive import, but probably worth it for goth completists. Vocalist Sven is several ticks more animated than most kraut-rockers, not straining away at the chops-licking lasciviousness of Rammstein but clearly putting his back into it. Title track recalls Fields of the Nephilim’s recent doings, infusing them with Fearless Freep jangle and hand-wringing vocal lines. […]

A two-person operation in the manner of Dresden Dolls but concentrating on the doom metal approach of St. Vitus, sometimes pegged to Boris speed, ie a homestyle type of jam usually restricted to the garages of the parents of axe-novice teenagers but which now has become accepted by undergrounders mainly because so many 4- and […]

(Wea/Earache Records) Speed up your basic Danzig record, add some Don Airey keyboard lines, drag Mastodon’s vocals into it and you have these Danish thrashers, who rip it up with some Buck-Dharma-like leads for added gravitas. As with most of this sort of product, key changes are a rarity – there’s huge interchangeability between songs […]

(CEA Records) The real-life story of Victoria Smith as told through music and narration has a distinctly PBS feel to it, revealing the high and low points of Victoria’s lifelong journey of self-sacrifice and service, both as a nurse and a Red Cross and Peace Corps volunteer. Through the subject’s autobiographical narration we become privy […]

(self-released) Definitively 90s, Philly’s MorningSide park themselves at the intersection of emo-ska and retail-grunge, combining harder shades of Braid with Foo Fighters daredevil-rock. Heavy users of Epitonic.com and other explorers will be stoked about their proudly displayed garage-ness and may get quite a kick out of the outstanding, crunch-blast lead work of Pete DiCanto, whose […]

(Napalm Records) Huge turnaround for Lacrimas Profundere, who with 2004’s Ave End hit the snoozer trifecta with a glum, rainy take on what Bauhaus might sound like if they were trying to get their most un-hooky things a little respect in today’s billions-and-billions-served market. Their targeting of the gothie brigade has been recalibrated with loud […]

(Interscope Records) Even if you detest reggae it’s difficult to wish the worst for Elan – it’s faux-rootsy in ways but not so much that it evokes images of honkies cranking it up solely to cling to memories of Caribbean vay-kays and annoy their punk neighbors. It’s a comforting, lighthearted record whether or not too […]

(Nettwerk Records) This column must still be on Nettwerk’s probation list, being that the love it gets from the corridors of PR is currently limited to quirky guess-my-classification tests released the previous month or week, not that they should stop in case anyone’s looking. A couple of months ago we went over Anathallo, whose weirdness […]

(Uncivilized World Records) You can’t accuse Michael Amato of being one of those lazy, opportunistic DJs who’s all about letting computers do all the work, as his second collection of mixes proves in all its straight-from-the-deck glory – no software was harmed in its making. Herein is all the trancy, cracked EBM you’d need for […]

(Camera Records) The funny thing about these guys is how they advertise themselves as a 60s band – a Kinks, Byrds, Simon and Garfunkel when the mood hits – and it’s actually true. Certainly all the Spacemen 3 worshippers who survived the Brian Jonestown Massacre would find a few songs – “My Big Fame” leaps […]

(Misra Records) Having tossed their folk ideas under the bus, Shearwater’s into Talk Talk these days as you may have heard, but it’s not quite that simple; there’s an altie slant to the stuff that’s indicative of a Yo La Tengo CD-buying binge (”La Dame et la Licorne”) and a delving into somebody’s old vinyl […]

(Rainforest Records) One-time Grammy nominee Donnay possesses a bee-stung soprano with a Ricki Lee Jones sense of devil-may-care that isn’t just art-school playacting. After 20 years of kicking around with such big shots as Huey Lewis and Neil Young, she returns to the standards with this one, possibly because her local espresso filling station didn’t […]

(Candlelight Records) Moody Swedish melancholia-metallers playing the Queensryche card for all it’s worth, but the end result is better and deeper than that may sound. The hookage in album opener “House of Plague” is explosive after a Dream Theater fashion, whereas “Bleeding” amps up the 70s-obeisant keyboards to realize a more Deep Purple approach. The […]

(Shark Meat Records) An indie label that plays like a major circa 1985, Shark Meat has now solidified their already strong knack for producing squeaky clean synth-pop from 1- and 2-person operations. Shimmerplanet’s follow-up to their 2002 debut, Welcome to Shimmerplanet, is hands down the label’s best release to date, showcasing the efforts of a […]

(SPV Records) If any band stood as a model for Spinal Tap (aside from, let’s be real, early Pink Floyd with all the unintentionally hilarious interviews) it has to be Saxon, although compared to the cookie-cut state of present-day nu-metal this live disk (apparently the 3rd in a series, meaning that somewhere on earth there’s […]

(Dangerbird Records) A nice break from late-to-the-party groovers who can’t bring themselves to admit that they like Sabbath, Darker My Love may not forge anything astoundingly new from their use of Vol. 4 guitar bliss, but coupled with the post-Spacemen-3 opium-den atmospherics familiar to whoever honestly listens to the Warlocks, you’ve got a winner on […]