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| Thursday, June 4, 2009 11:52 AM |
| (Last updated on Friday, June 5, 2009 01:43 PM) | | Latest musical discoveries |
 by Fëanor |
It's only been half a year since I did one of these, instead of the full year between the last two! Here's some of the best stuff I've discovered in that time.
[LATE ADDITION:
Middle Class Rut
AKA MC Rut. Looks like the band has put out a couple of EPs, and that's about it. I have the latest one: 25 Years EP. The band name and album cover led me to believe it would be lame, like untalented white guys doing hip-hop or something, but it's not that at all. The sound (vocals and music) is similar to Jane's Addiction, but louder and heavier. Catchy hard rock. I'm rapidly becoming a big fan.]
Amanda Palmer
I'd read a lot about Amanda Palmer from her partners in crime, Neil Gaiman and Kyle Cassidy, so when I saw her latest CD, Who Killed Amanda Palmer?, for cheap at the Record and Tape Trader in Rehoboth, I decided to give it a try. I loved it immediately. Catchy, clever, funny, and quite lovely. Plus, Palmer is backed up with some great piano playing and production from Ben Folds. My favorite tracks are the first two on the album: "Astronaut: A Short History Of Nearly Nothing" and "Runs In The Family." I'm also impressed by the guts it took to write a fun, jaunty song about rape, abortion, and fanhood ("Oasis").
Red Fang
METAL. I love metal. This band only has the one self-titled album so far, but it's evil and rocking. I'm a particular fan of "Reverse Thunder Restored," "Night Destroyer," and "Humans Remain Human Remains."
Witch
J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr. plus some other guys doing hard rock. Good stuff. I have the latest, Paralyzed, but they also have a self-titled from a couple years ago. Best track: "Space God."
Five Blank Pages
I don't even have the album by these guys (Last Blush), just the Young Glow EP. They're a bit... emo, I guess, but it's likable, moving stuff. Thoughtful, romantic indie pop, you might say.
White Lies
The resurgence of the New Wave continues! Maybe it's partly nostalgia, but I can't resist British '80s-style pop. These guys have one album so far, entitled To Lose My Life. My favorite track is "A Place to Hide." Or maybe "Fifty On Our Foreheads."
Black Math Horseman
I love that band name!! Seriously, that's like my favorite band name... maybe ever. They have one album, Wyllt, and it's solid. The Amazon product description toys with calling their music "ambient post-doom" or "alchemic psych-rock." Those are as good descriptions as any. It's metal that's spacey, wandering, and jammy, but never boring.
MarvelAnn
Smart, catchy, moving indie pop, with just a slight country flavor. Bad Advice appears to be the band's only full-length recording. No song in particular stands out, but they're all quite good.
Iron Age
More METAL. Brutal, epic, thrashing, fast-paced metal. It's a beautiful thing. \m/
Older, Well-Known Bands I Really Should Not Have Only Just Discovered
The Roots
Smart, funny, powerful hip-hop with beats that you just can't stop. I'm already close to owning their entire catalog. They have many ridiculously good songs, but my favorite might be "Here I Come" off of Game Theory.
Kristin Hersh/Throwing Muses/50 Foot Wave
poppy and many others have known of Kristin Hersh's brilliance for years, but I only finally got turned onto her and her various bands just recently. I'm still working my way through the incredible amount of music the woman has produced (all of which I stole from poppy), but it's only the rare track that's not either very good or excellent. I'm a particular fan of Hersh's work with 50 Foot Wave, as the stuff she does with that band tends to be harder and faster than the rest.
Liz Phair
For quite a while I only knew Liz Phair from her more recent stuff, which is mostly bland pop music that's interchangeable with a lot of the other bland pop music being put out by other artists these days. Then I heard Exile in Guyville. Not every song on here is a home run, but many are brilliant, biting, clever, funny, and still fresh after 16 years.
Portishead
Wow. What a unique and intriguing sound this band has. All I have is their latest, Third, but there's not a bad track on it as far as I'm concerned. Complex, thoughtful, eerie, fascinating. |
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