Sometimes I feel like a mom to all the bands I knew a few years ago, seeing and hear them grow and evolve over time; realizing creative facets of themselves and finding their own musical way.
Aggressive Persuasion – Faceless (EP)
The Aum Rifle – A Peal of Bells
I would like to start by saying that I think that The Aum Rifle has hit upon a great title for their new album, A Peal of Bells. Take a second and say it out-loud. Isn’t it a wonderful phrase? Now apply it to what you might expect from an album with such a title. […]
Badly Drawn Boy – One Plus One Is One
There’s something poignant about a singer and their guitar. If they’re able to really grab your attention and not be a mere backdrop to a latte frappe, then any added instrumentation is just whipped cream on your mocha.
Brutal Hand – Brutal Hand
The dark rumbling dirge of “March of the Condemned” is in no way a sign of things to come. The opening instrumental of locals Brutal Hand’s self-released debut is heavy and somewhat interesting. The first full proper song “1314” starts off promising enough with what sounds like the build up of an angry mob before […]
The Dollyrots – Eat My Heart Out
There’s something inviting and morbid about some of the cartoons we enjoy at the annual Spike and Mike’s Festival of animation or the killer bunny from Monty Python’s “Life of Brian.” On The Dollyrots debut on Panic Button/Lookout! Records, the CD cover displays a Japanese style illustration of a cute bunny, smiling while wielding a […]
Faithless – No Roots
Faithless always reminds me of the irony of my moving to Denver, of their Sunday at 8pm album that features The BlueBird’s marquee, just minutes from where I live now. I always thought that it looked like a cool spot to visit without a clue that it would someday become my new hometown. Faithless was […]
Fear Before the March of Flames – Art Damage
Sometimes it’s a mystery as to how a band was inspired by a given name. Franz Ferdinand is far from starting a world war, for example. Not so of this Aurora band, now gone national, as their heat and burn continues to take over the large and small stages across the country with an uncontrollable […]
King Gordy – The Entity
Lately, the rap game has been crowded with a consumer-friendliness that has left it somewhat lacking, in my opinion. It’s not that so much of it is totally without quality, but that not so many artists seem to really make a push to go as far as they can just because they can; there’s the […]
Little Fyodor – Live @ XX-Day
I must confess I had never seen, nor heard of Little Fyodor until his CD Live @ XX-Day crossed my desk. Apparently, he has been around for some time. In the early to mid-eighties, he was in a band named Walls of Genius, which seems to have broken up due to them beginning to take […]
Monofader – Frost
Overflowing with chunky beats and those velvet vocals made popular back in the ’80s, Monofader doesn’t really break any new ground, but one can’t help but be pulled into their dark and sexy web. Woven with the bouncy-ness of strobe light nights and the seductive quality of the Violator era of Depeche Mode, Frost is […]