Category
Review
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Me, Music, Review
Discussed: Curtis Harvey
My first encounter with Curtis Harvey’s music came via Rex’s C, around 1996 or so. Musically, I was starting to explore work that was outside the boundaries of the hardcore and alt-rock I’d previously obsessed over. It’s a fine, textured album that’s held up remarkably well, as has their followup to it, 3.
Rex vocalist Curtis [...] -
Live, Music, Review
Live: Hardly Pop; Mercury Lounge, 10.24.09 [CMJ 2009]
Eight bands, representing selections from the lineups of Hardly Art and Sub Pop. And thus, short takes on each.
Unnatural Helpers: Like Idle Times, with whom they share members, it’s solid, unpretentious garage rock. Dean Whitmore’s vocals sound like a more ragged Craig Finn circa-Lifter Puller, which is a plus; the sole downside was their 7 [...] -
Live, Music, Review
Live: Headlights, The Dutchess & The Duke, Dum Dum Girls; Music Hall of Williamsburg, 10.24.09 [CMJ 2009]
Arrived at the Music Hall of Williamsburg a few songs into Headlights‘ set. Last year’s Some Racing, Some Stopping ended up earning an unexpected amount of listening time — it’s a solid, enjoyable pop record, at times reminiscent of Saturday Looks Good To Me, but with less of SLGTM’s overt nostalgia and evocations of fading [...]
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Live, Music, Review
Live: Girls At Dawn, Idle Times, Smith Westerns; Don Pedro’s, 10.22.09
The latter part of last Thursday night was spent at Don Pedro’s, taking in an Impose-curated night of noisy rock music. Girls at Dawn took the stage shortly after I arrived, and it took me longer than expected to realize that they were not the three-piece that I took them for; there was, in fact, [...]
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Live, Music, Review
Live: The Press, Diehard; The Charleston, 10.22.09 [CMJ 2009]
The Press came highly recommended via friends of mine, with suggestions that their sound was a more accessible, rock-oriented take on the improvisational/ambient-fueled pop currently beloved in many circles of this city. I’m not sure I agree — the sound I heard recalled, in places, recent Modest Mouse and The Walkmen, albeit with a distinctly [...]
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Live, Music, Review
Live: The Seedy Seeds; Trash Bar, 10.21.09 [CMJ 2009]
Friends who had heard The Seedy Seeds previously told me after their set at Trash Bar had wrapped up that the space’s sound system had done them no favors, that certain elements of their sound had been lost in the mix. For my part, I still liked what I heard, even knowing that certain instruments [...]
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Live, Music, Review
Live: Broadcast, Atlas Sound; Le Poisson Rouge, 10.20.09 [CMJ 2009]
Despite a fondness for the bands in which Bradford Cox plays, I’ve listened to both Deerhunter and Atlas Sound far more in their recorded versions than in the live setting. Tuesday’s show at Le Poisson Rouge was my first time seeing the latter, and while I found myself nodding my head to the most direct [...]
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Me, Music, Review
Revisiting Rachel’s (by proxy)
In the summer of 1995, shortly before leaving my hometown for college, I went to a house party in Middletown, New Jersey — memorable in part because that was where I heard numerous bands who would later become personal favorites. Seam in particular, but also the Louisville post-rock ensemble Rachel’s. All of which is prelude [...]
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C&U, Music, Review
Reviewed: The Albertans // Legends of San Marco
The Albertans: Legends of San Marco
(Ernest Jenning Record Co.)
The restrained pop of “Marie,” the song that opens Vancouver-via-Brooklyn-via-Alberta group The Albertans’ album Legends of San Marco, is a good indication of the sensibility to come: a subtlety that calls to mind The Go-Betweens, interplay among multiple vocalists, and a sense that this band’s inspirations include [...] -
C&U, Music, Review
Reviewed: Reykjavik! // The Blood
Reykjavik!: The Blood
(Kimi)
If Reykjavik!’s 2006 Glacial Landscapes, Religion, Oppression & Alcohol was the sound of innovative late-90s hardcore (think Refused, think Blood Brothers) gone epically irreverent, this is something stranger: an AmRep crunch spliced with manic vocals halfway between doom metal and hair metal. In places, this takes it to somewhere close to the over-the-top [...] -
C&U, Music, Review
Reviewed: Ty Segall // Lemons
Ty Segall: Lemons
(Goner)
Lemons is the second album from Ty Segall, a San Francisco-based garage-rocker with ties to Thee Oh Sees. (John Dwyer’s Castle Face Records released album no.1 from Segall.) And while Segall is fond of throwing the occasional odd effect on his guitar, his work here takes a far more traditional path than the [...] -
C&U, Music, Review
Reviewed: Portland Cello Project // The Thao & Justin Power Sessions
Portland Cello Project: The Thao & Justin Power Sessions
(Kill Rock Stars)
The name of the Portland Cello Project tells you much of what you need to know about them; additionally, the number of cellists ranges from eight to sixteen, and their repertoire can include anything from classical pieces to video-game themes. Their latest includes four collaborations [...] -
Live, Music, Review
Live: Dean + Britta, Crystal Stilts; Prospect Park Bandshell, 08.01.09
08.03.09 | Permalink | 3 CommentsI think I’m coming around on Crystal Stilts. An abundance of people whose opinions I trust have had good things to say about them in the past, and I’m finding my indifference towards them moving distinctly towards the “like” column. Seeing them live had a dual effect on me: on the plus side, I found [...]
the scowl
Tobias Carroll lives in Brooklyn, New York. He has covered music and books for a number of publications, and his fiction has appeared in THE2NDHAND, 3:AM, Word Riot, and as part of Featherproof Books' "Light Reading" series. He is presently working on multiple projects of varying lengths.
