Girls - Album

Restructuring the catchy melodies and stripped-bare musical architecture of the Ramones for a west coast beach house garage party, the San Francisco-based two-man duo Girls (Christopher Owens and Chet "JR" White ) have crafted a infectious and charming debut album of California sunshine pop and fuzz-out surf guitar haziness. With a backstory that includes childhood cult indoctrination, a millionaire surrogate and prescription drug addictions, it all synthesizes down into their psychological-evaluation opening track "Lust For Life", as Owens line-lists aspirations for normalcy: boyfriend, father, suntan, pizza, beach house. "Ghost Mouth" slows down the signature 'boom ba-boom kssh' beat of the Ronettes to deliver an ode of dejected isolation and AM gold. Elsewhere, they unleash huge waves of sound as on "Summertime" which drops into hypnotic, wavering sonics of being lost in the curl, or "Big Bad Mean Motherfucker" which revs up and lets loose with an over-charged greasy guitar solo, with background harmonies wooing the whole affair in loving Beach Boy tribute. A deceptively simple record but executed perfectly.

Mr. Thing - Strange Breaks & Mr. Things II

Taking the DJ skills he's honed at DMC battles worldwide and digging deep into his treasured vinyl collection, Mr. Things of the Scratch Perverts releases his second set of rare and sought after breaks. Planned as a five-part series, Strange Breaks & Mr. Things revives the conceived beat mix-tapes from hip-hop golden era: scouring through bins of obscure 60s and 70s for the undiscovered, nasty break that can turn a thousand producers on and turn a party out. Starting with the funk-lite sitcom-jazz of "Sally", Mr. Thing re-arranges the eerie organ and drum backbeat on Dick Walter's "Spooky Doo" before scratching up the raw Michigan funk of Jake Wade and The Soul Searchers. Yes, anonymous names fill the roster here, with only one or two being familiar to only the most devote record collector. But whether its the disco-groove of Johnny Griffith, the sunny xylophone schmaltz of Jerzy Milian Orkiestra or the marching band cover of the Jackson 5's ABC by Hot Butter & Soul, Mr. Thing scoops out unexpected nuggets of funky delicacies from these underackngowledged sources, providing further stimulus for beat heads everywhere.

Frank Fairfield - Frank Fairfield

From the black and white album cover to the tinny, hollow recording process, everything on Frank Fairfield debut screams authentic. Or mimicry. For eleven songs, you can't find fault with the pure talent Fairfield shows. His voice creaks and tremors like the venerable Appalachian country music he admires. With a blazing hand, he works the banjo, guitar and fiddle as you'd picture the sun-dried fingers of Dock Boggs or Elizabeth Cotten doing, and his song selection is just as scholarly. From the mid-19th century post-civil war minstrel "To The Sweet Sunny South" or his quick playing opening arrangement of the John Henry's steel driving song "Nine Pound Hammer", Fairfield has steeped long and hard on a tradition he is respectfully keeping alive. But unlike the equally studied hand of Gillian Welch, Fairfield replicates instead of innovates, which boxes his album as an excellent academic survey. But what a terrific foreshadowing of possible future greatness.

Dead Man's Bones - Dead Man's Bones (Featuring the Silverlake Conservatory of Music Children's Choir)

Cringing at actor side-projects has become a natural reaction given the bevy of sour outcomes. But award Ryan Gosling a chance, for his partnership with fellow horror fan Zach Shields has yielded a first-rate macabre soundtrack for the Halloween season. Originally envisioned as stage production, Dead Man's Bones has the heft of grandeur, yet a number of rules kept it from over-inflating. Besides eliminating electric guitars and click tracks and including a kid's choir, they constrained themselves further with allowing only three takes for any performance. With such self-imposed amateurism, it's a wonder how they've accomplished such a realized spectral musical. Howling ghouls accents "Dead Hearts" as shattering glass confuses the cymbals and the thudding bass drum recalls Poe's beating heart beneath the floorboard. A greasy Cramps-like bashing romp stains "In The Room Where You Sleep", while "My Body's A Zombie For You" starts as a 50's line stroll, ending with a fully exuberant choir hand-clapping and cheerleading in unison: "I'm a Z-O-M / B-I-E. Zombie!" A bewildering surprise from an unlikely source, Dead Man's Bones is magical listen.

Karen O And The Kids - Where The Wild Things Are OST

Creating the soundtrack to the widely anticipated movie, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Karen O gathers up the key instruments that are universal amongst children playtime -- handclaps, shouting, percussive shakers and sugar-spiked exuberance. With the help of a kids' choir and a few fellow indie rockers (Deerhunter's Bradford Cox, Greg Kurstin of the Bird And The Bee, her fellow bandmates), Karen O And The Kids assemble ramshackled, punky-folk anthems that can inflate to cinematic, screen-filling proportions ("All Is Love") or collapse to dispirited, heartfelt ballads ("Worried Shoes"). Being a construct for a soundtrack, instrumental scores exist next to full-fledged songs, thus every track won't have the Karen O's gleeful, crackling vocals floating through it. But tracks like the hyperactive "Capsize" with its screeching guitar and its woozy center, or the downcast ache of "Hidaway" feel like excerpts from a Yeah Yeah Yeahs album, and make this soundtrack a "worth-wild" ride.

Black Heart Procession - 6

San Diego's Black Heart Procession prefer the shadowy corners, as its name may suggest, but their sound skips over the industrial aggressiveness of black-clad goth entirely. Instead, their mood and lyrical moroseness centers on the religious metaphors and bleak self-destruction that haunts the works of Johnny Cash and Nick Cave. On 6, Black Heart Procession took their time creating these depressed vignettes, executing them simultaneously as they recorded a new Three Mile Pilot album, their legendary secondary outfit. Opening with "When You Finish Me", its Cave-like delivery and melancholy piano begins shuddering out of daylight as this album sinks into the roots of Americana gloom. "Heaven And Hell" stirs with an Wurlitzer gospel organ and somber marching line, as a perceived saviour is instead the punishing finisher, while "All My Steps" is a junkyard tango with its percussion instruments resembling clattering hubcap and oil barrel, as a Spanish guitar begins the affair. Black Heart Procession move exceptionally between the cheerless emotions of Leonard Cohen to the rickety dramatics of Tom Waits, showcasing the demons on their back.

The Avett Brothers - I And Love And You

The Avett Brothers have gotten shoulder-tapped to join the big leagues. Leaving their tireless promoter Ramseur Records for the major-label calling of American Recordings, this North Carolina trio continues to expertly marry the ramshackle acoustic sweetness of The Band with the tender, pensive lyricism of Townes Van Zandt. With production assistance from grizzled vet Rick Rubin, The Avett Brothers sound tuned to perfection: a cello embedded in vocal harmonies, string sections swelling to grandiose elegance, with all the acoustics sounding hearth-warmed. But equally, their songs carry an introspective and softhearted appeal. "January Wedding" captures the adoring excitement of a fiancé's crush: "She knows which birds are singing/and the names of the trees where they're performing/ in the morning." The emotional gravity pull of "The Perfect Space" has the rumpled feeling of an older man in reflection. But just a quickly, they can kick in the beat, and return to revved-up rock and roll as on the amped-up piano pop of "Kick Drum Heart" and the hand-clap bop of "Slight Figure Of Speech". A well-excuted album from start to finish.