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We are living in a bold new age of information. YouTube represents an archive of millions of hidden or long forgotten documentaries of some of the greatest performers in music, free and at the tips of our fingers. This week Street covers "Oneday" off Japan post-rockers Euphoria new album, White Pattern.
!!! (pronounced "chk-chk-chk") hits its three-year release schedule like clockwork with its third dance-punk album Myth Takes. The band has replaced most of the dissonance of their last release with experiments into genres like funk. This keeps their music fresh, and the beats are as good as ever. The first five songs on the album are exemplary. "Heart of Hearts" is one of the best ways to introduce your friends to the dance-punk genre. The interplay of its male-female dual vocals and the bouncing bass will make this song a standout of the year. The story isn't so rosy for the rest of the album, though, which is rife with filler tracks.
Jonny Lives! sounds so much like Weezer, a friend passing by who heard this record playing stopped and asked where this new Weezer single could be found. Jonny Lives! claims classic groups like The Stooges and The Who as their progenitors, but they're not nearly as venerable. The band's radio-friendly power pop draws more from the pomp of Butch Walker and the singing style of Rivers Cuomo. The result is a sort of attenuated cock rock you'll enjoy for a while, but you won't be eager to go back.
Winterpills The Light Divides After the first few tracks off The Light Divides, the Winterpills' new album, you might think you're listening to the Dawson's Creek soundtrack. With songs consisting of only two chords and optimistic vocal crooning, the album starts out in a monotonous tone that doesn't snap until track four, "Broken Arm". By blending the voices of Phillip Price and Flora Reed to create a fast-paced, melodramatic sense of musical urgency, "Broken Arm" is unmatched throughout the remainder of the album. The next pair of tracks, "Shameful" and "Eclipse," also have pop, but these three unfortunately round out the songs worth listening to on the album. "Shameful" integrates a rolling guitar twang with blended vocals to make a weak hybrid of The Shins and the voice of Arcade Fire's Sarah Neufeld. All too often, the Winterpills end up trying to make their songs hazily majestic with yearning vocals on top of powerful guitar. Meanwhile one can only think that perhaps these methods are best left to Creed's Scott Stapp. The Winterpills succeed at creating a constant eerie drone in their songs, but unfortunately have little innovation to separate themselves from other indie bands. This is one example of indie rock that should stay independent of listeners. - Colin Jacobsen
There is nothing quite so cloying as the sound of a completely mediocre album. The Safes unleash Well, Well, Well on the world with nary a regard for hooks or cohesion. The album's songs flow together indeterminately, and with the whole thing clocking under half an hour, one is thrown clear from the accident without much permanent damage. The Safes tried. Their power pop sound certainly has a place, but would probably be better off in the hands of more capable songwriters. The band adopts a very no-nonsense instrumentation. Then it tries its hardest to be British, like an angstier Beatles or punk version of The Kinks. But the whole effort falls apart when one realizes there's not much of a redeeming value here. Just when you start to like a song, it finishes abruptly, or it veers off course or you realize that the whole basis for your liking is because The Safes for a second remind you of other, better bands. A few times on Well, Well, Well, The Safes sound as good as those bands. But the moment is fleeting, like the instant you realize during Spring Fling that you still have work to do. It is a shame this space could not be spent on more promising artists.
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. It's a motto that most aptly describes Sparklehorse's latest, a merely competent album that explores little new ground. Dreamt for Light Years, his first record in five years, is a likeable entry in the singer Mark Linkous's somewhat folky discography, but it won't command anyone's attention.
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