MGMT
Oracular Spectacular

If you were snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef (on acid) and decided to dive under to get a closer look, MGMT’s Oracular Spectacular is the world that you would find. This album is the soundtrack to the multitudes of rainbow-colored creatures jolting around the playgrounds of coral, electric eels making ribbon love, giant clams blowing bubbles and schools of miniature translucent fish simply swaying with the lapping motion of the tide.

MGMT (pronounced “Management”) consists of the awkward goofballs, Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden. After making some weird music together at Wesleyan University they ended up in Brooklyn (surprise surprise) but instead of conforming, the duo found their own sound and blew all the overhyped Brooklyn scene bands back to Manhattan.

Oracular Spectacular is MGMT’s first full length release and their psychadelic electro...

Chris Walla
Field Manual

The Smart Little Brother Can't Step Out of His Older Brother (Or His Families) Shadow.

Solo albums are tenuous bits of music. They can go, overtly, one of three ways; they can sound exactly like their former bands albums (Ben Folds would be a sufficient example, The Color Fred another), they can be nothing short of brilliant (Dustin Kensrue), or they can flat out stink (The Prize Fighter Inferno). So for Chris Walla, producer and guitar player extraordinaire of Death Cab For Cutie, to step out into the spotlight on the coattails of his brilliant band-mate Ben Gibbard's equally excellent side albums (The Postal Service, All-Time Quarterback)... well it raised some questions. Would Walla's debut sound like Death Cab music? Would it sound like the unrelated Postal Service? Would any of the Death Cab members be involved in its creation? Would it be any good?

The answer to all...

Tyler Ramsey
A Long Dream About Swimming Across The Sea

It's not very often that a band simply inducts a new member. They expand their instrument lineup, absolutely. Replacing a band member is also essential. But to add in fresh blood, to help out with the same duties already spoken for by other band members - a true rarity. Such is the case with Tyler Ramsey, recently recruited for Band Of Horses. Obviously, they heard something special - and now with the release of his album "A Long Dream About Swimming Across The Sea", we all get to share in the experience of this very special artist.

First off, if you're not a fan of Red House Painters/Sun Kil Moon, you can turn away now. In fact, if I heard "When I Wake" or "Iris" isolated from the rest of the album, I wouldn't believe that it wasn't Mark Kozelek singing. However, Ramsey smartly decides to place these songs beside each...

Black Mountain
In The Future

In the 1970's, countless psychedelic rock bands pondered what the 2000's would bring. That time is here now, and Black Mountain used their self-titled debut album to remind us how much the future was supposed to rock. All the hip bands today are aping the sounds of the 90's and the 80's, so many people shrugged off Black Mountain's (and side-project Pink Mountaintops') rehashing of 70's rock as outdated mimicry. What Black Mountain have accomplished in their full-length follow-up, In The Future, is a re-imagining of the wide-eyed wonder of classic rock through a filter of the bleak cynicism music is plagued by today; and we are presented with something in the middle ground. In The Future is cold and world-weary, yet wide open to possibility.

All it takes is 30 seconds. Just a half-minute into "Stormy High", and you'll know if you're in for the ride or not. ...

Smashing Pumpkins
American Gothic

Too Soon, Billy! Too Soon!

Last year’s Zeitgeist wasn’t nearly as terrible as the hipster media would have wanted you to believe. Sure, it seemed like a crass cash grab, but so did the recent Led Zeppelin reunion, and that kicked ass (by most accounts). There are enough good ideas on that album to keep it afloat and earn its place on my shelf. After the relative success of the Zeitgeist album/tour, I had hoped that Billy Corgan would acknowledge the criticisms that were thrown at the album. At the very least, I had hoped that he would get the hint that he needs to listen to outside sources and take them into consideration. Sadly, American Gothic shows that he’s still living in his own little world.

Composed of songs reportedly written during the band’s residency stands this past year, American Gothic has a great idea behind it: all acoustic...

Lupe Fiasco
The Cool

An Atom Bomb that Won't Make a Dent in the Civil War of Hip-Hop.

Hip-Hop is under siege. Popularized by drug dealing icons like Jay-Z, Tupac and the Notorious B.I.G., rap took a decidedly glorified stance on killing and selling controlled substances. However, socially conscious, middle class men like Kanye West and Common have risen to answer, because poppy dancing did not rely on cocaine, even if that dancing didn't really mean anything. Then there is the hidden racism of MTV and anglo culture, entranced by the "hard knock life" of gangster rap and uneducated youths. The ideas of this ever growing civil war could fill 10 albums worth of useless banter on both sides (re: 50 Cent, T.I., Common's newest LP).

But Lupe Fiasco figured it out in one song ("Dumb It Down") and one def poetry slam ("Babba says Cool for Thought"). Lupe's new album, The...

Rivers Cuomo
Alone - The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then the images of Rivers Cuomo through the years in the liner notes of Alone: The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo sum up the variations in Cuomo’s musical career. There’s the young Rivers sitting on his bed appearing dazed as though he woke up with guitar in hand, and the heavy metal Rivers on stage coated in sweat, with hair flowing down to his stomach. Then there’s the goofy Rivers that the world would meet in 1994, wearing thick rimmed glasses and looking the complete antithesis of a rock star, and full-bearded Pinkerton style Rivers playing a clarinet. Bizarre emo glam rock Rivers is here, wearing leggings (?!?) and eye shadow. Finally, there’s the scholarly yet still out of place Rivers, fitted with cap and gown and displaying his Harvard diploma. It’s only fitting, as this is the man who penned unforgettable classics like...

Bran Van 3000
Rosé

The original modern Canadian supergroup is back for another healthy helping.

The world of music was very different 10 years ago. In 1997, the majority of marketing went into artists' personal names and images (rather than the band as a unit), anything ironic and retro was unhip, and Montreal was just another Canadian city no one cared about. One of the biggest radio hits of the year was "Drinking In L.A.", a catchy-as-hell tune that melded rock, hip-hop and pop and sent North America spinning. However, only 1 in 5 people could tell you it was performed by Bran Van 3000, a French-Canadian supergroup that sarcastically melds cliché lyrics and diverse genres into a distinct stew of disparate ingredients. Glee was a killer debut album, with an absolutely massive hit . Unfortunately, no follow-up single was delivered (despite "Everywhere"...

Streetlight Manifesto
Somewhere in the Between

Ska is Dead.

Or at least that’s what some would like you to believe. There are still a good lot of people whose sole interaction with the genre came from Reel Big Fish’s 1996 minor hit “Sell Out”, which may be considered the one and only hit. Sure, ska bands have had big songs (No Doubt, anyone?), but there’s not been any big ska album outside the “ska scene” since Turn the Radio Off. In the time since the album’s release, there’s been a lot of great albums to come out (Hello Rockview), and a lot of crap to come out (Dinosaur Sounds). As such, there’s not been a real reason for the public at large to give a damn about ska or any bands that even remotely have ska influences. I guess, in a sense, that maybe ska is dead. But then something like Streetlight Manifesto comes along and smacks around all notions of what ska is,...

Puscifer
"V" is for Vagina

Depending on your freak level, you will either be utterly disgusted by this album, or you will fornicate to it.


Avid Tool followers might be disappointed by Maynard James Keenan’s newest project curiously named Puscifer, but to the virgin listener (like myself), "V" is for Vagina is as intriguing as its sounds.

Once you get over the fact that Puscifer is not Tool or A Perfect Circle, you begin to appreciate Puscifer for what it is – Maynard’s creative sexually-obsessed somewhat comedic manifestation. As Maynard warns in capital letters on his Myspace page (which by the way has 68104 Billion friends), “CHECK YOUR OVER INFLATED EXPECTATIONS AT THE DOOR. Cuz this is simply a playground for the various voices in my head.”

So what do the voices in Maynard’s head sound like? They are creepy but seductive at the same...

The Hives
The Black and White Album

Somehow The Hives have become as silly and derivative as Spinal Tap.

No time is wasted to start things off; "Tick Tick Boom" blasts out the speakers with a fury that is invigorating and downright chilling; upon first listen I received the same goosebumps as the first time I heard Veni Vidi Vicious. That album was a big deal when it was released in 2000; the press and music fans everywhere declared The Hives were "saving rock music". But a span of 4 years followed before the release of Tyrannosaurus Hives, which unfortunately was received with indifference. It was a fun album to be sure, but it sounded too clean and polished for a garage rock band. Another three years later, and the opening 5 songs on The Black and White Album are an absolute blast. They serve as the perfect middle ground between the longer, more pop-oriented...