#17: Travis Morrison Hellfighters>All Ya'll>Ketchup leaves a nasty stain

Artist : Travis Morrison Hellfighters
Album : All Ya'll (1st Domestic LP)
Release : 08.21.07
Year Founded : 2004
Label Name : Barsuk Records
Catalog # : 67
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Jewel Case
Members : Saadat Awan, David Brown, Brandon Kalber, Travis Morrison
Runtime : 41:45
Area Tour Dates : None at time of publication
Sound Season : Summer
iTunes Worthy Tracks : I'm Not Supposed to Like You (But), As We Proceed, East Side of the River, I Do
Sounds Like : Enon Believo!
Rating : B+



I guess this is the Travis Morrison Hellfighters' first record, although Morrison does have one other post-Dismemberment Plan solo album. Lineup changes end up being the major difference though, because both albums could easily pass for an album by his former band, The Dismemberment Plan. That's not so much a bad thing (The Dismemberment Plan were catchy, exciting, and, above all, innovative), it just illustrate's how one-sided the songwriting process must have been for them.

All Ya'll starts off strong with the quick "I'm Not Supposed to Like You (But)," and the jumpy "As We Proceed." The former features a slithery and persuasive bassline and snappy, propellant drumming, but its greatest asset is when the verse goes double-time, which it does every third measure. The former switches focus, putting the onus on the guitar to deliver its bouncy energy, after which it beats a hasty retreat, returning only to join forces with the bass in order to power an anthemic chorus. Consider also the drums and percussion as their own heroic entities and you have a indie rock Voltron of sorts. The second verse gets perhaps a little self-referential about Morrison and the eventual collapse of The Dismemberment Plan, although it's equally as likely that it's about reconciling being religious and a rock star.

Breezin' in, breezin' out, livin' life full of doubt
It's nothing that a Catholic boy should fuck with.
'99, that's the year, I figured out
that I'd have to make it work my own way

After this excellent beginning duo, All Ya'll absolutely screeches to a halt with "Catch Up," which tries to be playful and quirky (a milieu that Morisson has pulled off before), but quickly turns into a circus of disassociative ideas. It sounds like a pig pile of scraps from the cutting room floor, which reaches its ineffectual pinnacle at a little over the three and a half minute mark when the barrage includes (from what I can discern) guitar, bass, drums, percussion, three keyboard tracks, and two unrelated vocal tracks, which mesh with eachother in no way, shape or form.

Thankfully, Morrison comes to his senses again with the lucid and calming "East Side of the River" and never falters again. The rest of the album is a great balancing act. If a song is exceedingly dancy, it's lyrics are acerbic and subversive. When the vocals get eccentric, the music stays sober and to the point. Despite the strengths of the later songs, it's almost as if they are somehow tainted by the buffoonery of "Catch Up." They fail to captivate the way the first two tracks do.

Travis Morrison Hellfighters manage — like The Dismemberment Plan — to continue to carry the torch of keeping things fun and still respectable. All Ya'll would be immensely improved with the omission of "Catch Up," but I have to give him credit for trying something different and failing rather than delivering eleven tracks of safe sameness. Just don't let it happen again.

#16: Pinback>Autumn of the Seraphs>The second screen

Artist : Pinback
Album : Autumn of the Seraphs (5th Domestic LP)
Release : 09.11.07
Year Founded : 1999
Label Name : Touch and Go Records
Catalog # :
Packaging Type :
Members : Roberdale Rulon Crow Jr., Chris Prescott, Mario Rubalcaba, Zach Smith
Runtime : 44:05
Area Tour Dates : 10.10.07 @ Roxy, Boston
Sound Season : Autumn, Winter
iTunes Worthy Tracks : From Nothing to Nowhere, Barnes, Good to Sea, Walters.
Sounds Like : Black Heart Procession Amore Del Tropico
Rating : A

Admittedly, I haven't ever disliked a Pinback release. Liked some songs less than others? Sure. But ever since I heard "Loro" one day — I guess eight years ago now — I've been hooked. So I can't exactly say that I am an unbiased listener. All that aside though, Autumn of the Seraphs, despite its unfortunate cover art (and title, for that matter), is truly a success that stands not on the shoulders of previous albums, but all on its own. This album is almost as good as hearing them for the first time all over again.

My favorite Pinback song has always been "Prog" off of Blue Screen Life, which is their defining album. The sense of urgency in that song, with its short, stabby vocals weaving their way in and out of the traffic of muted guitar riffs and plentiful drum fills, always just gets me every time. I've always been left wanting more of that and it finally comes through on "Barnes." Even though its tempo is markedly slower than "Prog," it has the same Morse code style vocals (dot, dash, dot, dash, dash, dot, dash, dot) and it has the same acute, zig-zagging guitar/bass interplay that gets you all pumped for the sing-along chorus.

There's also the "Penelope"-esque "Good to Sea" and "Blue Harvest," which seems to immediately conjure Police comparisons (there seems to be at least one of these on each of their albums). The exquisite melancholy of "Walters" and its yawning guitar and lullabye piano lines is wonderful too, but even better when it is later smashed to pieces by the drums, which drop into the song with all the grace of an anvil.

Autumn of the Seraphs contains some of Pinback's best songwriting. The diversity of tone, vocality, mood and tempo is seemingly effortless and the attitude, intent and character of the guitar and bass are so skillfully meshed that it sounds like one instrument. The only thing I dislike about the album is that it is going to be exceedingly more difficult to get into one of their shows now. But your tickets early.

#15: Slaraffenland>Private Cinema>The little engine that really wasn't sure what he wanted to do

Artist : Slaraffenland
Album : Private Cinema (2nd Domestic LP)
Release : 06.26.07
Year Founded : 2005
Label Name : Hometapes
Catalog # : 016
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Bi-Fold Hardcover Slipcase
Members : Niklas Antonson, Bjørn Heebøl, Jeppe Skjold, Christian Taagehøj, Mike Taagehøj
Runtime : 50:26
Area Tour Dates : None at time of publication
Sound Season :
iTunes Worthy Tracks : Show Me the Way, Watch Out
Sounds Like : Broken Social Scene Broken Social Scene
Rating : B-

Also the name of an amusement park in Denmark, Slaraffenland means "land of milk and honey," and the art of Private Cinema is laden with odd, but nonetheless adorable creatures happily carousing across a starkly grassy landscape, with all the charm of the classic Golden Books.

The band begins the album, however, with "Sleep Tight," which — ironically — is a dark and moody prelude. A giant dark cloud suddenly sweeps into view, engulfing the once brightly-colored and idyllic cartoon landscape, turning the cute and fuzzy creatures into deformed, flesh-hungry abominations. But as a flute flutters, one gets the sense that there is a survivor among them — that there is yet hope for the syrupy sweet and inherent goodness of the cute-sy woot-sy. And, indeed, the track does end on a light note. The horns herald the dawning of a new day. The world has been changed, but life continues.

There is no grand moment of overcoming though. No triumph. This world is doomed to live in the shadow of its former self. "Watch Out" makes that alarmingly clear with its instruction to "run for cover," its caution that "out there you'll get hurt" and its exclamations of "better watch out!"

Most often Slaraffenland's vocals, like in "Show Me the Way," are more like chanting. There's only maybe four to eight lines of lyrics often repeated twice. There is no singular voice, no frontman, and they contain no personal investment and no narrative. The vocals act more as texture and to keep the listener from floating off into the music's broad openness. Stylistically, the music could be compared to Broken Social Scene, especially on a track like "Polaroids." It is dense, often primal, exotic, and energetically anxious. But the mood is entirely different. Replace the spontaneous joyousness of BSS with the haunting sadness of Sigur Ros and add in a paranoic and anarchic unease and that would bring you to the outskirts of Slaraffenland. Nothing like an amusement park.

Much of the Slaraffenland is incongruous unfortunately. It becomes hard to reconcile one moment feeling alone, one moment feeling safety in numbers and the next moment believing that those numbers may just be a figment of your crippled imagination. The opportunity for the listener to settle in to this record never presents itself. As if backed into a corner, the band flails it arms and launches projectiles — does whatever it can, really — to keep its potential fans at a distance. And although there is that frustration from being unable to penetrate Private Cinema's true meaning, there is still the intriguing draw — as is the case with any coded communication — of the story behind its suffering.

#14: Spoon> Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga>Do what you do because you do do it well

Artist : Spoon
Album : Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (6th Domestic LP)
Release : 07.10.07
Year Founded : 1994
Label Name : Merge Records
Catalog # : 295
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Digipak
Members : Britt Daniel, Jim Eno, Eric Harvey, Rob Pope
Runtime : 36:26
Area Tour Dates : None at time of publication
Sound Season : Spring
iTunes Worthy Tracks : Don't You Evah, Rhythm & Soul, The Underdog, Finer Feelings
Sounds Like : Alfie A Word in Your Ear
Rating : B


If Spoon are anything, they are consistent. From song to song and from album to album, they deliver catchy, hooky, memorable music with no big learning curve and no hipper-than-thou fakery. Their more than adequate formula for success includes punk rock swagger, pop levity and indie smarts.

That being said, there is a fine line between consistency and resting on your laurels. I don't think that they've crossed that line just yet though.

There is plenty of material on Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga to be excited about like the immediately cool shoulder-shaker "Don't You Evah" (after which the album really kicks into high gear) and "The Underdog," which has overtones of Stranger-era Billy Joel.

However, I'm inclined to think that Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga is comprised of songs that didn't make it to Gimme Fiction. I'm not sure that this is evidence of my theory, but the cloaked figure on the cover of their previous album also appears on the bottom right of Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga's back cover. The "leftovers" album theory would explain both the brevity of the album (or is this just a larger trend in the industry, because I've been seeing a lot of it lately) and its static trajectory. Nonetheless, Spoon don't seem capable of writing a truly bad song and, thus, they can get away with doing that sort of thing.

Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga has its shortcomings, but it is as worthwhile a listen as nearly anything in Spoon's celebrated catalog. Fans can be finicky creatures — always wanting something new and different while still wanting more of the same. So although Spoon have shown little inclination for making any drastic changes, we can at least be happy they're still making good music.

#13: Blktop Project>Blktop Project>This is not smooth jazz, but my dad might like it anyway

Artist : Blktop Project
Album : Blktop Project (1st Domestic LP)
Release : 06.12.07
Year Founded : 2002
Label Name : Galaxia
Catalog # : 25
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Digipak
Members : Ray Barbee, Tommy Guerrero, Matt Rodriguez, Doug Scharin, Chuck Treece
Runtime : 24:48
Area Tour Dates : None at time of publication
Sound Season : Summer
iTunes Worthy Tracks : Blkwater Blues, From Here to Where, Last Call
Sounds Like : Six Parts Seven Casually Smashed to Pieces
Rating : B


The Premise: Three pro skateboarders meet a zany scientist who builds them a way old-school board (I mean, like, 9 inches wide with mad concave, no nose and a huge tail) that also is a time machine, which the guys use to travel back to the 70s to record soundtracks for blaxsploitation films ("Beans for Breakfast"), and maybe some porno ("Rained Out").

Seriously though, Barbee, Guerrero and Rodriguez are all skateboarders who moonlight heavily as musicians and who actually do have quite a bit of talent and are rather prolific to boot. If the eighties were their true heyday for skating, then now is their heyday for music.

As much as this is a collaborative effort, it sounds very much like Guerrero's solo albums minus the samples and generated beats. The songs are bass heavy and groove-based and frighteningly smooth — serious lounging by poolside kind of music. If the music was a layer cake, the bass would be the cake parts and the drums would be the frosting in between with whipped cream guitar dolloped on top.

Though some folks can make a solid album from 8 tracks, this is more like a long EP (which may actually be the case). My other gripe is that this album could have benefited greatly from some more adventurous production. All of the sounds almost sit in the same field, making for a relatively flat listening experience. There is so much opportunity for creating textural boundaries which goes unrealized except perhaps for when foreign elements such as electronics or trumpet are thrown into the mix, such as on "Blkwater Blues."

For an album that was created as a sort of aside to a magazine-sponsored skateboarding tour (see notes on the back cover), it still hits most of its marks, especially for mood. Its shortness almost precludes it from attaining its full potential, but it is an able outing nevertheless and a more focused and fully-formed version would be a welcome development.

#12: The Self-Righteous Brothers>In Loving Memory Of ... >Googly eyes!

Artist : The Self Righteous Brothers
Album : In Loving Memory Of... (1st Domestic LP)
Release : 06.26.07
Year Founded : 2003
Label Name : Black & Greene Records
Catalog # : 005
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Jewel Case
Members : Jake Hall, Max Koepke, Justin McLean
Runtime : 40:17
Area Tour Dates : 07.19.07 @ PA's Lounge, Boston
Sound Season :
iTunes Worthy Tracks : Floyd, Lee Torsee, Alan Watts, Graduated Cylinder, Concerto in Drop D
Sounds Like : Stephen Malkmus Face the Truth
Rating : A-


The Self Righteous Brothers come out of left field with nothing preceding them — no PR blast, no sticker on the album telling you they are the best thing since The Beatles, no endorsement from indie rock stars or outcasts. Nothing. Nothing except a chuckle-to-yourself band name and a picture of the band in head costumes reminiscent of any of the Sid & Marty Krofft shows.

My extensive research (and by 'extensive research' I mean I made this up) indicates that they are a bunch of twenty-something Jimmy Buffett liking high school dropouts from the Boston area, and not these forty-something Jimmy Buffett worshipping cover creeps.

These musically-inclined bastard children of R. Crumb's "Mr. Natural" and Gilbert Shelton's "The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers" are best on jams like "Lee Torsee," which features strained and shouting vocals that exude a faint whiff of J Mascis. But the song has a damn lot of character, what with the funky bassline and the spasmodic guitar solo and all-out freak out with horn section during the song's latter half.

The rest of the songs are both internally and externally diverse as well. The trio seem to write a full song amongst themselves, then write another song with their backing band and then marry the songs together in a kind of Frankensteinian I'm-enraged-because-I'm-not-a-whole-man-and-not-because-I'm-really-a-monster kind of thing. Take for instance the transformation of "Diana" from a soulful slow jam into a harmonic pop song which melts into "Concerto in Drop D" as a hyper indie-pop thrasher and finally into a mobius strip of bass and lilting guitars bringing to mind one of the more meditative Modest Mouse songs.

With so many bands nowadays sounding so much like everyone else, In Loving Memory Of... has a sort of "anything goes" attitude that doesn't think twice about mixing funk with ska with garage with country-twinged rock. You get the sense that these fellas have the ADD, but they're taking their medication semi-regularly enough that you don't need to grab them by the shoulders and give them a good shake to get them to focus.

The Self Righteous Brothers are capable musicians (they make that immediately clear on the instrumental opener "Floyd") having fun and not taking themselves too seriously, as is so often the case these days (emo-goth-hipsters, I'm looking at you). They even have a video for "Alan Watts" that is a claymation of miniature people stabbing eachother with stuff. They may be a little funny and a little weird, but they are not a joke band. They're just different — in a good way.

#11: A Band of Bees>Octopus>Something old, something new, something borrowed, something tentacled

Artist : A Band of Bees
Album : Octopus (3rd Domestic LP)
Release : 06.26.07
Year Founded : 2002
Label Name : Astral Werks
Catalog # : 92788
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Jewel Case
Members : Paul Butler, Kris Birkin, Michael Clevett, Aaron Fletcher, Warren Hampshire, Carly Lacey, Heather McCallum, Andy Parkin, Itchy Parkin, Tim
Parkin
Runtime : 39:18
Area Tour Dates : None at time of publication
Sound Season : Spring, Summer
iTunes Worthy Tracks : Love in the Harbour, Got to Let Go, End of the Street
Sounds Like : The Sadies Favourite Colours
Rating : B+

Anyone who listened to A Band of Bees' (also known as simply "The Bees") last album, Free the Bees, probably experienced the sort of deja vu that I did. Hearing the album for the first time actually felt like I was hearing it for the first time in 10 years. The songs were immediately familiar even singing and humming along. From song to song, the album was a mish-mash of styles ranging from 60s garage to 60s soul to 60s pop rock, but always sounding distinctly 60s. So much so, in fact, that you often had to wonder if they weren't just playing covers, or if the band was in fact a band from the 60s whose tapes had fallen behind the shelves only to be unearthed 40 years later.

Octopus continues that trend, but has A Band of Bees getting a little more creative. Regardless of the fact that Free the Bees was an absolutely stellar album, one gets the sense that the band caught a lot of flak for sounding too much like their forefathers. So, instead of playing what could be construed by some as sound-alikes of popular tunes from back in the day, they try to forge their own way. They end up sounding quite the same stylistically, but the songs are less familiar. The listener now has to work a little in order to grow into the songs. And The Bees make it worth it.

The opener is a merry jaunt not dissimilar to (aptly enough) "Octopus's Garden." That is followed by "Love in the Harbour" which has a very Byrds-esque folk-rock twang and sing-along chorus to it. "Got to Let Go" is a powerful song in the sense that it just makes you shake. The combination of the busy rhythm, the catchy horn and organ melody, and the punctuational bass really infiltrates your nervous system and for that five and a half minutes your motor functions are at the mercy of The Bees. The lyrics then seal the deal with their wit and fancy.

I've got a job back in Texas
cutting the grass before breakfast
cleaning the park
I'm there till it's dark
but I'm saving up for a Lexus

The album hits a bit of a lull with the soulful slow-burner "Listening Man" and continuing through the groovy "(This Is for the) Better Days." The latter being the only one out of the three that continues to not sit well with me. The guitar is so soft and smooth I think Kris Birkin may have been playing a jar of Vaseline. Having said that, the song isn'y nearly a failure, it just that its redeeming qualities don't effectively nullify my discomfort. But whatever aftertaste is left by the slimy "Better Days" is quickly neutralized by the mouthwash of the bi-lingual "The Ocularist" and the especially fun "End of the Street."

Whereas Free the Bees was all old, Octopus is both old and new, and in that sense A Band of Bees have challenged their fans. They want to see who among them likes them for who they are rather than who they remind them of. And anyone who is looking for more than just a nostalgic rehashing should be happy with Octopus.

#10: Maserati>Inventions for the New Season>A world laid to waste

Artist : Maserati
Album : Inventions for the New Season (3rd Domestic LP)
Release : 06.19.07
Year Founded : 2000
Label Name : Temporary Residence
Catalog # : 120
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Jewel Case
Members : Matthew Cherry, Coley Dennis, Gerhardt Fuchs, Steven Scarborough
Runtime : 46:28
Area Tour Dates : None at time of publication
Sound Season : Winter
iTunes Worthy Tracks : Show Me the Season, The World Outside
Sounds Like : Explosions in the Sky Those Who Tell the Truth Shall Die, Those Who Tell the Truth Shall Live Forever
Rating : A-

Instrumental music ought to be engaging enough to make your brain try to illustrate the sound. Anything that I imagine while listening to Maserati's Inventions for the New Season ends up being cinematic. It's usually aerial views from a plane or a helicopter of bombs being dropped, things blowing up, people fleeing, enveloping chaos. It's apocalyptic. The moments of serenity are as frightening as the moments of upheaval. Sometimes it's time-lapse photography of animals or insects preying on eachother. Sometimes it's simply the opening credits — a landscape at dawn, the view out a car window. Most important to note is that there is always a passage of some sort, whether it be of time or of place or of mind.

In this way, Inventions for the New Season offers little in the way of instant gratification. Everything takes time. Everything is a development of what has come before. Everything is a natural progression. Whether that progression is toward the ultimate destruction or salvation of the world that Maserati helps create is open to interpretation.

Musically, Maserati sound like the dark side of The Mercury Program (who they appeared on a split EP and LP with). They use layers of either prickly and delayed or fuzzy and omnipotent guitar, swirling bass, and unifying drums.

Previous albums had slightly more defined edges. They were more contained, less massive. It's like 37:29:24 (their debut album) was the isolationist Maserati and Inventions for the New Season is the world-view Maserati. The bass was more talkative, more loopy — it broke up the sound a bit more than it does here. It provided much-needed contrast to the drenched aural field. Scarborough gets back to that aesthetic somewhat on "Show Me the Season," but otherwise is mostly status quo.

Although there are some departures, Inventions for the New Season is a significantly satisfying album. With fewer and fewer of the post-rock set interested in or able to tell these stories of cataclysm, Maserati are certainly among the ruling class.

#9: Bumps>Bumps>Polyrhythms are my peanut butter

Artist : Bumps
Album : Bumps (1st Domestic LP)
Release : 06.19.07
Year Founded : 2007
Label Name : Stones Throw
Catalog # : 2157
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Jewel Case
Members : Dan Bitney, John Herndon, John McEntire
Runtime : 31:48
Area Tour Dates : None at time of publication
Sound Season : Winter
iTunes Worthy Tracks : Biotic Discussion, Baby Johann, Dawn at Dawn, Don't Cry My Son, Swingland Hit
Sounds Like :
Rating : A-



Bumps, being the 3 rhythmsmiths from Tortoise (among others), have issued a record soon to be in the crates of all self-respecting turntablists out there. You might be confused if you aren't familiar with the Chicago boys' other forays into the indie-hop world, but let's be clear right up front — Bumps is a breaks record.

Records like this aren't typically meant to be listened to. They are most often just a source from which to sample and build other music from — a library of possibilities for a producer. Bumps is entirely listenable though. Despite being all one type of thing over and over with variations, the players have enough creativity and imagination to minimize the monotony. Its like breaks is the language of the record and each song is a different dialect.

Bumps is like a sentient drum sequencer enjoying a night on the town. He's just hoppin' and boppin' down the street with a big ol' grin on his speakerface. Not only are the beats flawless, but they're also full of character. The songs are all basically one movement with fills flooding all the corners and in-betweens. They're quick, they're deft, and they're bright. The snare is skittery, the hi-hat tight-lipped, the bass drum glowing with tone.

In short, this short gem offers a lot. Tortoise fans will appreciate Bumps as a showcase of the percussion section's abilities ("Can You See" is unmistakably a taken right from the heart of Standards "Seneca"), drummers will appreciate it as a superb study of the form, and indie-minded hip hoppers will appreciate it as a nasty collection of breaked-up beats.

#8: Queens of the Stone Age>Era Vulgaris>Vulgarity is boring

Artist : Queens of the Stone Age
Album : Era Vulgaris (6th Domestic LP)
Release : 06.12.07
Year Founded : 1997
Label Name : Interscope
Catalog # : 9039
Packaging Type : Single-Disc Jewel Case
Members : Joey Castillo, Joshua Homme, Troy Van Leeuwen
Runtime : 47:24
Area Tour Dates : None at time of publicationSound Season : Summer
iTunes Worthy Tracks : 3's & 7's
Sounds Like : Party of Helicopters Please Believe It
Rating : C+







What throws me about Queens of the Stone Age is that I did not like their last album right away. It was one of those records that grows on you. It was the follow-up to a masterpiece of a rock record and it was a bit more understated. But there were absolutely singles that just popped out at you. So you had to go back for more. And then you realized even the less obvious songs were excellent. All of this has me second-guessing my initial assessment of Era Vulgaris.

The songs on Era Vulgaris aren't terrible. They all contain at least one nugget — either musically or lyrically — that makes you stop a second and say, "huh. that was cool." So why does the album end up being so boring?

It's possible that the flat, everything-is-in-the-same-sound-field production is to blame. It's possible that Josh Homme and company have spread themselves so thin across side-projects that the quality of song they're bringing to the table for their main gig is suffering. It's possible that all the lineup changes have really diluted the Queens' focus. Or it could be just as simple as a band can't put out this many records in a ten-year span and have them all be scorchers.

There aren't any real obvious singles like there was on Songs for the Deaf or Lullabies to Paralyze. "3's & 7's" is undoubtedly the only real contender. Homme's voice finally comes to the fore in the jumpy verse. A rattlesnake tambourine rears its head every now and again. The second guitar yelps like a frightened dog. And then the chorus comes along with a real disco bass line on one hand and a real pump-your-fist-and-sing-along moment in the other. But — and this is a big 'but' — it stands alone among less-inspired yawners that just drift by without making their mark.

Who knows? Maybe more of Era Vulgaris will grow on me. Its entirely possible, but it has got less on it that would make me come back for more in the first place. Right now though, if someone asked me, I would advise that they download "3's & 7's" and skip the rest.