Robin Thicke – Paula
It’s been almost a year since Robin Thicke released his most successful, self-titled album to date, which notably scored him countless radio airplay, Grammy nominations, and multiple Billboard Music Awards. Now, he’s back at it, eying up the top of the charts by...
Ab-Soul – These Days
Towards the end of 2012, Kendrick Lamar brought him and his crew into the mainstream with the masterpiece Good Kid, Maad City. Kendrick, ScHoolboy Q, Ab-Soul, and Jay Rock had been releasing high quality free projects and independents albums for the last few years as...
RIFF RAFF – NEON iCON
Gonzo internet rapper RiFF RAFF has achieved the kind of success that is uniquely 21st century; his distinctive look, humorous Twitter account, and cartoonish brand of materialism have made him something of an absurdist icon within the rap community, despite his...
Lone – Reality Testing
British producer Matt Cutler began recording as Lone in 2007 and has since been responsible for the some of the most inventive, dynamic tracks in dance music in recent years, layering hip hop drums with 90's rave-inspired synths to create a maximalist sound that...
Pogo – Younghood
Mostly everyone understands the idea of a sample or snipped included in a piece of music. The point, if the musician gets it right, is to relate the clip to the thematic vibe of the music or lyrics. Many hip-hop artists do this successfully (Wu-Tang Clan, Aesop Rock)...
Total Control – Typical System
Just when the world thought it had enough modern 80’s synth-rock reincarnations to sort through, Australia’s Total Control releases Typical System, an album that churns out all the goth-rock nuances in all the right places. But with any genre-replicating album, it...
Lana Del Rey – Ultraviolence
Even if you aren't a fan of the mega-pop star Lana Del Rey from small town Lake Placid, New York, you've heard her hits--"Young & Beautiful," "Blue Jeans," or "Summertime Sadness" rolling through the speakers of bars, clubs, and beaches (I can assume, some of her...
Street Eaters – Blood::Muscles::Bones
Blood::Muscles::Bones, the second full length release by Bay area band Street Eaters, reads like an ominous autobiography for the Berkley duo. How long can they withstand this experimental jet set lifestyle? A global tour schedule that has taken the band around the...
How to Dress Well – What Is This Heart?
In sharpening his craft, Tom Krell has ventured out on a journey of self-reflection on his alter ego How to Dress Well’s third studio album. Condensed within the album's twelve songs, Krell has set out to answer the very question that the albums title asks: What is...
clipping. – CLPPNG
Before I start this review I just wanna touch on one thing real quick. The whole phenomenon of bands/music groups, cutting out vowels in song/album/artist names or replacing them with Vs, is so played out. I can't stand the name of this album, just make it a...
The Antlers – Familiars
Since Hospice emerged as a narrative record of tremendous emotional force in 2009, The Antlers have consistently defined themselves through their weightiness. There is no hip posturing, no casual cleverness, and very little pop sensibility to the music they spin forth...
First Aid Kit – Stay Gold
First Aid Kit, composed of the elven-queens Klara and Johanna Soderberg, hit an Internet nerve after they placed their cover of hit Fleet Foxes song “Tiger Mountain Peasant Song” on YouTube back in the year of 2008. Shortly before that, they had already re-recorded...
Fucked Up – Glass Boys
In their new release, Glass Boys, Canadian hardcore punk outfit Fucked Up demonstrates their knack for tasteful anthemic punk rock, albeit in a more modest way than usual. This time around, the band looked to more self-reflective and moody elements to join their usual...
Glass Animals – Zaba
It was just this past April that the promising Oxford-based quartet Glass Animals cemented themselves a tight little niche in the psychedelic indie-pop market with their beaming EP Gooey. Now they’ve returned with their debut album, Zaba, to prove that beyond the...
50 Cent – Animal Ambition
Animal Ambition works when 50 Cent understands that he's worth 140 millions dollars. Sometimes 50 gets caught up with his life back when he was fresh off of being shot 9 times, straight off of the streets, and all the other details that made him one of the best...
Parquet Courts might sound like punk slackers, barely capable of playing their instruments let alone organizing actual songs, but on closer examination such a judgment wouldn't be quite accurate. In an interview with the Washington Post, the band reveal an astute...
SBTRKT – Transitions
SBTRKT had the right idea when he split his latest LP, Transitions, into three phases. Each two track pairing plays off the thematic tones of the one before. The latest of the three came out today and it signals a darker, ominous twist from this formerly upbeat and...
Ben Frost – A U R O R A
With his new album, A U R O R A, electronic musician/composer Ben Frost sheds a new light on the genre, merging experimental minimalism with a modern rock sensibility. Finding a middle ground between artificial sound and live instrumentation, the record stands alone...
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah – Only Run
“How can I open up?” asks Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s Alec Ounsworth on “As Always”- the opening track of the band’s latest release. He seems to have answered his own question, as the song- a cosmic cascade of phaser synths and Ounsworth’s signature howl- introduces...
Meyhem Lauren & Buckwild – Silk Pyramids
"So Queens that you could feel me, so dope that you could deal me." That's what NYC rapper Meyhem Lauren asserts on the opener of his latest album Silk Pyramids with producer Buckwild, and that's the script that he sticks to for the length of this impressive project....
After getting mocked on Letterman for their dozy on-stage theatrics, The Orwells seem poised for the big time with their second LP. "Who Needs You" is already making its radio rotation rounds with gusto, and the Pixies punch of its...
Hundred Waters – The Moon Rang Like A Bell
I am afraid that my fingers will have kelp on them from my time spent in the sea. The humid tendrils of wind make me crave a fresh, cold drink. Immersed in the salty water, I hear an echo of a glorious sound, coming closer with each vibration. After I raise my head...
The Roots – …And Then You Shoot Your Cousin
For a legendary hip-hop band with nearly three decades of legendary albums, it is only natural for The Roots to eventually hit a wall in terms of creative output. With mostly underwhelming production style, their new record ...And Then You Shoot Your Cousin is not...
Sam Smith – In the Lonely Hour
Anyone unfamiliar with the rather ordinary sounding musician Sam Smith may notice him from his featured vocals in Naughty Boy’s chart topping “La La La” or Disclosure’s club smash “Latch.” Now he faces the challenging task of matching the quality and success of his...
Deniro Farrar – Rebirth
2014 looks to be a pretty big year for Charlotte rapper Deniro Farrar. Last year saw the release of two mixtapes (Patriarch and Patriarch II), which helped him to a selection to the illustrious XXL Freshman Cover for 2014. Signed with Vice Records and Warner Bros,...
Sharon Van Etten has followed up the exquisite Tramp with another husky, dusky take on relationship devastation and persistence. Are We There, the Brooklyn songwriter's fourth album in five years, is dark and forceful as an expansive folk undercurrent lifts the music...
Mac Miller – Faces
Mac Miller has taken an unconventional path as an artist. He gained notoriety as pseudo-frat rapper after a couple mixtapes as a late teen, then released an independent that was number 1 on Billboard. With a style that appealed to the mainstream, and a debut album...
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart – Days of Abandon
When The Pains of Being Pure at Heart debuted in 2009, the band endeared instantly. A song like "Young Adult Friction" felt wide-eyed and wistful, vividly realized and alive with youth. The tracks on Days of Abandon, the New York City act's third album, are aged and...
Sylvan Esso – Sylvan Esso
There are very few new albums in 2014 that have struck me song by song. The War On Drugs' Lost In The Dream and Porches' Lost In The Cosmos are two of those. It pleases me to say that I have found a third. Sylvan Esso, comprised of former acapella-folk singer Amelia...
The Black Keys – Turn Blue
It's been a busy week for Patrick Carney. The Black Keys have just released their 8th (can that be right?) studio album, and he's somehow managed to find time to reignite his old beef with Justin Bieber. While he's correct in his opinion that Justin Bieber is pretty...
Thunderegg – C’mon Thunder
C’mon Thunder, the new release from San Francisco's Thunderegg, is the album we just might deserve. Full of lyrical real life experiences, as in the way they actually happen and not the way we thought they would happen, sometimes a creative licence is just a cop out....
Willie Watson – Folk Singer Vol. 1
In the summer of 2012, my family traveled two and a half hours to see a musician named Willie Watson play at an anti-fracking festival in his hometown of Hector, NY. The festival was free, in a grass lot, and Willie was one of maybe eight other musicians on the day’s...
The Horrors – Luminous
Names can be deceiving. In spite of their moniker, The Horrors are about as terrifying-sounding as a hot bath or a warm shower (which post-Psycho still might be scary for some). The band also isn't light and effervescent enough to be described as Luminous, the title...
Andrew Jackson Jihad – Christmas Island
Andrew Jackson Jihad is the type of group that can make you want to laugh and cry at the same time. Their lyrics are undeniably witty and hit you with a punch, and after settle in with a pinch of reality. Christmas Island, their latest album-length release, is both...
Lykke Li – I Never Learn
The Swedish-bred Lykke Li has an incomparable way of conveying her self-reflecting lyrics on I Never Learn, her third and final installment in what she describes as a trilogy about the whirlwind emotions of a young woman. As was the case for her previous two albums, I...
Damon Albarn – Everyday Robots
Damon Albarn, of Blur and Gorillaz fame, has always been a maverick, pushing pop music into fairly atypical, frequently imaginative territory. On his first full-length solo album, the legendary alt-rocker, working from a slower, more subdued, sonic position, has...
Mystic Braves – Desert Island
Mystic Braves is one of those groups that tend to ramble on. Since their last, self titled album, they haven't quite figured out how to stray from their original sound, which is a western-influenced, rawhide feel. For starters, I'm not asking that a group create...
tUnE-yArDs – Nikki Nack
If ARTPOP was a small trip into Lady Gaga’s creative mind that tried to combine art and pop culture into one musical form, then tUnE-yArDs' new album, Nikki Nack, is a full on exploration of pop culture sweetly crafted into an unorthodox collection of rhythms and...
Gucci Mane and Young Thug – Young Thugga Mane La Flare
With the release of Young Thugga Mane La Flare, two of the biggest trap stars in the game in Young Thug and Gucci Mane take on a project full of banging club tracks. Young Thug is the up and coming Atlanta artist that has been making waves with hit club singles like...
Chad VanGaalen – Shrink Dust
As a newcomer to the land of Chad VanGaalen, Shrink Dust is quite the brazen introduction to the Albertan singer-songwriter's musical ethos. Known for his imaginative lyrics, full of sci-fi world-building, offbeat preoccupations, and demented wordplay, VanGaalen is on...
Medeski, Martin, & Wood + Nels Cline – Woodstock Sessions Vol. 2
Medeski, Martin, & Wood sure like their fair share of jazz guitarists. Recently, they teamed up with Nels Cline, who if you weren't aware of, is the guitarist for one of the U.S.' most famous bands, Wilco. On this collaboration, Woodstock Sessions Vol. 2, the...
Neon Trees – Pop Psychology
It was just four short years ago that Utah-bred quartet Neon Trees scored its first hit on the mainstream pop charts with “Animal,” and only two years since the group followed that smash with the irresistibly catchy “Everybody Talks.” The new wave pop group consisting...
Pharoahe Monch – PTSD: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
Pharoahe Monch's PTSD provides a nice contrast from the usual super lyrical rap album. Monch has mostly been known for his lyrical dexterity and his technical rap skill, and as expected, that is all on display with this theme album. There is great variety in his flows...
Woods – With Light and with Love
With Light and with Love, as its creators must have intended, is light and lovely. Yet for an album offering semi-straightforward psychedelia that seems tamer than Tame Impala, there is a fair amount of sonic playfulness. Joy jumps from each note. Woods, a folk rock...
Japanther – Instant Money Magic
"Do it--don't try it" could be Japanther's motto. The duo, consisting of Matt Reilly and Ian Vanek, have proven they can keep creating fresh, innovative material again and again. Their approach is just as avant-garde as it is rooted in plain old experimentation. Since...
Ratking – So It Goes
Let's be honest--New York City is still a main hub of culture when it comes to the arts, but it's changing rapidly. A constant topic of discussion is gentrification, basically, in more simple terms, the 'neighborhood is changing.' Defining a 'New York' artist sound is...
Avey Tare’s Slasher Flicks – Enter the Slasher House
After more than a decade together as one of the most prolific and unorthodox psychedelic-pop indie bands, Animal Collective's founding member Avey Tare has decided to break away and form an alternative trio side-project called Slasher Flicks. Unlike many of the less...
Cloud Nothings – Here and Nowhere Else
Cloud Nothings' face-crunching fourth album is a fearless, assertive follow-up to 2012's Attack on Memory. Oscillating between a chaotic rush of existential howls and throaty but tuneful melodies, Here and Nowhere Else pounds its presence out through furious snare...
Thievery Corporation – Saudade
Rob Garza and Eric Hilton are busy guys. Since forming Thievery Corporation in the late '90's, they've produced eleven studio albums, with the release of Saudade as their twelfth. Normally when one thinks of Thievery Corporation, they are associated with the acid-jazz...
Mac DeMarco – Salad Days
NOTE: This review was written immediately after returning from a Mac DeMarco concert in Cleveland, in which he and his touring bassist licked me in the face (I gave Mac a Valentine and asked for a kiss in return. He obliged me.) and then I talked to him and...