Album of the Week

Alex Berkley – 28 Days of Fun 4: 30 Second Songs

March 13, 2025

This week’s Album of the Week spotlight shines on a delightful, recently re-released gem from Buffalo’s own Alex Berkley: 28 Days of Fun 4: 30 Second Songs. Berkley, a respected figure in the local songwriting scene, is known for his stripped-down folksy bedroom pop, and this album perfectly encapsulates that aesthetic. 28 Days of Fun 4 is the fourth installment in Berkley’s “Fun-a-Day” series, a project where he commits to writing and recording a song every day in February. This particular iteration, originally a somewhat hushed release on SoundCloud back in 2017, found it’s way to Bandcamp this past February to join Berkley’s first three Fun-a-Day installments. A self-imposed challenge of keeping each track around 30 seconds long finds Berkley embracing the fleeting on this go-around, a move that distills the songwriting to a playful, honest core.   The Fun-a-Day project itself has roots in the Buffalo arts community, originating[...]

Survey Channel – Functional Gloss

March 6, 2025

Buffalo’s ever-evolving electronic music scene continues to yield fascinating projects, and Survey Channel, the alias of Matt Donatelli, stands firmly at the forefront of its ambient exploration. With Functional Gloss, Donatelli delivers his fifth full-length album, adding another meticulously-crafted chapter to a discography that has steadily blossomed since his 2019 debut, Mulberry. In the intervening years, Survey Channel has has become synonymous with a particular brand of thoughtful, exploratory electronica, gathering a respectable following from such a prolific output over the past six years. Functional Gloss is our album of the week.   At its core, Functional Gloss operates within the realm of ambient electronica, yet it’s an ambient experience imbued with a restless energy. While certain tracks embrace beat-driven structures, the album as a whole resists easy categorization, comfortably inhabiting the spaces of IDM while pushing against the conventional boundaries of electronic music. Listeners familiar with titans like Boards[...]

Rotten UK – Age of Chaos

February 27, 2025

Grab your leather jackets and bullet belts because Rochester metal punk veterans Rotten UK are back with a vengeance on their sophomore full-length album, Age of Chaos.   Bandmates James von Sinn, Matt Sexxx, Anarchy Jake, and Fran Damage violate your speakers with their distinct style of 80’s UK crust punk forged with gothic undertones, thrashy power chords, and dominating drums. von Sinn’s vocals are straight from the depths of a London dungeon as he shouts and howls songs of revolution, horror and the occult. Their snobbish, drawling delivery adds a thick layer of anarchistic attitude that rounds out Rotten UK’s throwback speed metal sound.   Age of Chaos doesn’t waste any time melting your face off with the opening track, “Annihilation Desecration.” It’s a hyper shot of pure adrenaline that will get your heart pounding. Like a runaway rollercoaster, Damage’s frenetic kick-snare drums propel the track at warp speed[...]

Robbery Club – Loot

February 20, 2025

Punk rock will never die – and Buffalo four-piece Robbery Club (RC) are here to prove it. Doesn’t it feel like nobody wants to start up a guitar band anymore? Nobody told RC – and while this isn’t their official debut (and they’ve formed from the ashes of previously-beloved act Ghostpool), it’s a much-anticipated continuation of what promises to be a beloved oeuvre. They’re calling this one Loot, a perfectly succinct, five-song drop of songs made to play at unreasonable volumes in a sweat-soaked basement. Top it off with a healthy dose of existential dread and you have yourselves our album of the week.   The EP kicks off with “Bitter Pills,” an adrenaline-soaked blast of fun emo punk energy – what else? Spitfire guitars, punched-up drumming, and gritty bass will be the calling cards throughout this EP – for a batch of punk songs, you don’t need much else.[...]

Head North – Winner!

February 13, 2025

Head North – Buffalo’s favorite cosmic rock act of yesteryear…? Maybe 2025 actually *is* the year of long-awaited reunions? If so, Head North’s resurgence is a harbinger of wonderful things to come.   This band has been through many different forms throughout the years – led by the incomparable Brent Martone and rooted by the strong and inventive drumming of Ben Lieber, Head North has always managed to push the limits of whatever genre they’re inhabiting in that specific moment in time. This time, they’re joined by Eli Ritter on guitar and John Vaughan on bass – the result is their latest offering, Winner!, a wildly inventive and certainly cosmic batch of twelve songs that have as much (or even more) in common with late 90s electronica acts like Moby or Primitive Radio Gods as they do with the emo and pop punk roots where they planted their roots. Gone are[...]

Jaugust – Functional Gray

February 6, 2025

In the quiet spaces between other projects, Buffalo-based duo Jaugust refines its voice. Comprised of Anthony Del Plato and Nick Sessanna–musicians already well-known within the city’s indie circles for their work in bands like Everything In Waves, Cooler, and Genesee Hotel–Jaugust returns with Functional Gray, their sophomore EP. Self-produced in Del Plato’s home studio during moments carved out from busy schedules, this collection of songs shares a creative headspace, blending emotional indie pop with a distinct electronic pulse. Functional Gray places Jaugust in conversation with similar acts like The Postal Service and Washed Out, yet establishes their own distinct collaborative approach that expands on the emotional core of the duo’s 2023 debut. Functional Gray is our album of the week.   The new EP is built on a foundation of contrasts, where analog warmth meets digital precision. Jaugust combines digital found sounds, shimmering synths, and understated drum machines with the[...]

Humble Braggers – New Life

January 30, 2025

Humble Braggers have polished up some uncut gems. A heavy-hitter in Buffalo’s synthpop space, the band has just dropped their third full-length album, New Life, which–as the band describes on Instagram–isn’t just a collection of new tracks. Instead, their latest effort is a curated selection of songs spanning their eleven-year history, all of which originate from demos first recorded between 2014 and 2022. The songs, now repurposed and packaged into a tidy ten-song LP, give listeners a peek behind the curtain and a glimpse into the evolution of their sound over the last decade. New Life is our album of the week.   Singer Tom Burtless described the album’s genesis as a retrospective look at their unreleased material around the band’s tenth anniversary mark. Their guiding principle for completing these songs was one of restraint: minimal new elements were incorporated, existing arrangements were largely preserved, and any intelligible lyrics remained,[...]

Ismatic Guru – An Incredible Amount of Overwhelming Information

January 23, 2025

Buffalo’s Ismatic Guru, the hyperactive prog-punk brainchild of John Toohill (aka Science Man) and Bran Schlia (aka Helmsley), has finally unleashed their long-awaited full-length album, An Incredible Amount of Overwhelming Information. This isn’t your typical album release; it’s a culmination of a years-long recording project, a sonic archive of the duo’s relentless creativity. Over the past few years, Toohill (guitars, vocals, lyrics) and Schlia (bass, organ, drums, production) have meticulously crafted and released a series of numbered EPs, each a limited edition cassette run, building a following through their respective labels (Swimming Faith & Steak and Cake) and beyond. Now, those EPs, along with five brand new tracks, have been compiled into a 26-song, breakneck journey that encapsulates their self-described “idiot-prog punk adventure.” The band’s growing fanbase is well-deserved; with over 15k monthly listeners on Spotify and a dedicated Bandcamp following, it seems Ismatic Guru’s brand of chaos is striking[...]

Carmen & Lizzy – Dissolving

January 16, 2025

For the better part of a decade, Buffalo folk-duo Carmen & Lizzy have quietly woven themselves into the fabric of Buffalo’s music scene, having built a following with their heart-on-your-sleeve songwriting, finely-tuned vocal harmonies, and a sound that blends folk intimacy with indie sensibilities. Now a recognized force, the duo–made up of cousins Carmen O’Keefe and Lizzy Bassler–has just released Dissolving, their first substantial offering of new music in over 5 years. This 6-song EP finds the duo gently pushing the boundaries of their established folk aesthetic for a sound that matures alongside their songwriting and keeps the mystifying qualities that put them on Buffalo’s map. Dissolving is our album of the week.   Dissolving widens the scope of Carmen & Lizzy’s discography. While their earlier work, like the 2019 full-length Climate, leaned into a starry-eyed folksy vulnerability, the new EP is a bit more enigmatic and exhibits growth in[...]

Raybees – Reaper, Take My Life For Free!

January 9, 2025

It’s a new year, and what better way to shed that holiday lethargy than with a blast of sonic mayhem? Buffalo’s own basement psych-rockers Raybees are here to deliver just that with their sophomore EP, Reaper, Take My Life For Free!, out January 3rd. This self-released, self-recorded, six-track onslaught picks up where their debut left off, but cranks the intensity and noise up by a good margin. If you’re a fan of the noisy, psychedelic punk rock of bands like Osees and The Jesus Lizard, then buckle up. Reaper, Take My Life For Free! is our album of the week.   Raybees is led by the core duo of Jacob Smolinski (guitar/vocals) and Dan Keegan (who replaced the drum machine of the project’s debut), along with featured players Matthew Danger Lippman (guitar), Kam Plotner (synth), and Brandon Schlia (bass). Something of a star-studded side project, Raybees showcases a completely different[...]

Chores – Tender As A Wound

December 19, 2024

The Rochester local music scene has had a damn good year. Rounding out our Album of the Week column for 2024 is Rochester trio Chores‘ debut album Tender As A Wound, which delivers a dose of ’90’s-inspired indie rock that’s both familiar and refreshingly off-kilter. The band, consisting of Ian Egling (vocals, bass, synth), Scar Markham (drums, vocals), and Jenn Wameling (guitar, vocals), skillfully blends their prowess for a sound that would be especially palatable to fans of Pixies, Miracle Legion, and Pavement. With that 90’s influence worn proudly on its proverbial sleeve, Tender As A Wound places a well-deserved exclamation point at the end of Rochester’s excellent 2024 run.   The album seems to be in conversation with its influences, sometimes echoing them affectionately (“Rocks In Your Pockets” in particular is steeped in a Malkmus-esque eccentricity), other times acknowledging them with a simple, friendly nod (“Tripwire” ditches the fuzz[...]

Matt Smith’s Nervous System – Today and Tomorrow Too

December 12, 2024

Matt Smith’s Nervous System, a Buffalo-based project led by scene veteran Matt Smith (guitar/vocals) alongside Roddy Potter (drums) and Colin Pratt (bass/vocals), returns with Today and Tomorrow Too, a six-track EP stealthily released on October 18th. Following two full-length LPs (Close Down The Dream in 2021 and The Age of Reasonable Expectations in 2023), this concise offering marks a shift in approach, focusing on atmosphere and texture. It feels like a compelling next step for a project that started as a mere outlet for Smith’s extraneous ideas. Today and Tomorrow Too is our Album of the Week.   The EP conjures the understated groovy cool of The Velvet Underground and serves it up with a simmering intensity not unlike the sounds of indie rock stalwarts The National. The result is an effort that strays a bit from the bluesy power-pop vibes of their debut in favor of a more introspective,[...]

Big Nobody – Charlie’s Alive

December 5, 2024

Big Nobody is a relatively new name in the Rochester local scene, but don’t be fooled: the members of this fresh garage-pop powerhouse have been purveyors of fine sounds for over a decade now. Featuring members of fan-favorite local acts from both past and present (Total Yuppies, Comfy, Calicoco, Wild Pink), the DIY supergroup’s sophomore album Charlie’s Alive brings the groundwork laid by singer/guitarist Jacob Walsh (on the band’s electrifying debut in early 2023) to new heights. The riffs are louder, the songwriting is still spirited and heartfelt, and best of all–the album invites you in, like you’ve known these guys for years. Big Nobody’s Charlie’s Alive is our Album of the Week.   This is an album for the people. Charlie’s Alive gets the infrastructure just right by enmeshing radio rock hooks that put bands like Everclear and Third Eye Blind on the map with the punk rock inventiveness of[...]

Welks Mice – BLUB BLUB

November 28, 2024

Six years, a pandemic, and a whole lot of life later, Buffalo’s Welks Mice have re-emerged with BLUB BLUB, an EP that trades some of the anxious energy of their 2018 debut for a sound that is softer around the edges, but no less genuine. This time around, songwriter Max Weiss and vibraphonist Andre Welks-Fabretti hone in on themes of optimism and openness, their delightfully economical indie-pop providing the perfect backdrop. It’s honest, it’s tender, and it’s our Album of the Week.   Welks Mice’s unique approach to minimalism is a refreshing breath of air in a local scene dominated by distorted guitars and crash cymbals. Welks-Fabretti’s charming vibraphone melodies make up the majority of arrangements, and Weiss’ unabashed ‘cards face-up’ lyrical delivery is disarming and accessible. The combination is distinct in style, blending the best elements of bedroom pop and anti-folk for a sound that would sit nicely next to[...]

Comfy – Goated & Foreboded

November 21, 2024

Comfy is a band that never stops moving. The now-Rochester-based power-pop outfit of frontman Connor Benincasa has called home to three major cities in the last decade, and has put out three times as many releases. Friends, band members, and collaborators rotate in and out of the band’s roster on every couple albums with Benincasa remaining the band’s only constant. It’s not just churn and burn though–the amount of deliberation that goes into the music is obvious, most notably on the full band releases. Goated & Foreboded–Comfy’s latest LP and our Album of the Week– just might be the band’s strongest effort to date.   Goated & Foreboded listens like something Harry Nilsson would’ve written if he had joined Weezer for the Blue Album sessions. Equal parts provocative and digestible, the album meanders seamlessly from beachy easy-listening (“Wait”) to sludgy garage rock (“Spark”). The range is especially impressive because nothing[...]