Aa

Aa – Gaame

Every genre is an opening for exploration, and if you’ve previously turned your nose at the slightest whiff of a drum circle, consider taking a second sniff. New York’s percussive noise rock quartet Aa (pronounced “Big A Little a”) reformat the wild clamoring of percussive tribalism into an avenue for further experimentation by folding its hypnotic rhythms around an dizzying array of tape loops, synthesizers, and manipulated and modulated vocals. But don’t consider this album a cerebral endeavor; there are enough rhythmic explosions to second as an external defibrillator. Each track quickly bursts out bright and intensely, rarely stumbling out of a three minute range, except for the goliath seven minute closer, “Horse Steak”, where all their knob twisting and voice-as-sound investigations are allowed to run amok. Volitale? Yes. But perfect for dousing your Burning Man float in flames, then stomping it out to the beat. Weak of heart need not apply.

Electrelane

Electrelane – No Shouts No Calls

With their last album, Axes, the female UK quartet Electrelane stepped away from the charming pop of its astonishing second album, Power Out, by revealing and reveling the dissonance that was always just a finger scratch beneath the surface. Their love of angular British post-rock where extended into feisty Krautrock jams, and smothered with skronky saxophone and piano-down-a-staircase pounding: a recipe any Sonic Youth fan could admire. Now, returning with their fourth album, No Shouts No Calls, they’ve once again shown restraint, yet still pursue all their compositional chamber rock influences. The surging pulse of lock-grooved drumming still prevails as much as their layered harmonizing, power guitar outbursts, and the noodling on vintage Farfisa keyboards, all of which shines within the gorgeous clamor of “Between The Wolf And The Dog”. If you still prize your old Can and Neu albums, you’ll be doing yourself a big favor in discovering these English ladies.

Pink Martini

Pink Martini – Hey Eugene!

The early 60’s snapshot of a cigarette-flicking, freshly made-up and party-outfitted redhead should clue you into the mind frame of the Pink Martini’s new album, Hey Eugene, and their signature sound: an orchestrated prelude to a night out culled from yesterday’s jukebox. The dreamy, string-glistening and soft vocal opening track “Everywhere” recalls MGM’s golden era with its rich melody, something Dorthey would have cooed to distraught Toto. The upbeat starts with Carmen Miranda’s 1934 rumba “Tempo Perdido”, then continues to hopscotch across the globe for its playlist. “Taya Tan” is a sultry Japanese nugget that envisions James Bond at play in the Orient and with a twenty-five member choir, Pink Martini translates the Arabic number “Bukra Wba’do” into a Rodgers & Hammerstein show tune, without the slightest hint of schmaltz. Billy Holiday’s favorite vocalist, Jimmy Scott, close the night with his baby soft whispering soprano that practical seduces those high heels off for you.

Amiina

Amiina – Kurr

Arriving out of Iceland with a resume that name checks their native cousins Sigur Ros as well as glockenspiel lover Sufjan Stevens, the four ladies of Amiina now daintily rap at the doors of a larger audience with a sound that is as delicate as it is arresting. Kurr (Icelandic for “cooing”) opens with a gentle refrain that couples toned orchestra bells with perfectly tuned plucked strings, a mesmerizing organic intonation reminiscent of Brian Eno’s ambient endeavors. Swirling a mix of violin, cellos, and atmospheric electronics together with wordless voicing and an array of oft-overlooked instrumental sounds (the chime of tuned water glasses to the tremulous warble of a singing saw), Amiina weave melodies into either euphony compositions such as the richly layered soft horns of “Bláfeldur”, or mini sonic investigations as on “Lúpína” where detuning strings segue way into the fat raindrop sounds of a thumbed Kalimba. All of which is an entirely relaxing bliss.

Wilco

Wilco – Sky Blue Sky

Having impressed the critics circle with two distinct albums- one emitting purposely deconstructed pop songs (Yankee Hotel Foxtrot), the other percolating with various song structures, from propulsive Krautrock to dissonant-tinged classic rock (A Ghost Is Born)- Jeff Tweedy now turns down the Bunsen burner on his musical experimentation, and leaves the laboratory for the outdoor sun. Sky Blue Sky is the sound of Wilco enjoying a spring time drive, dusted with the acoustic richness that also sprinkles many of Neil Young’s 70’s recordings. In fact, it’s the addition of avant-garde jazzist Nels Cline and his energized electric guitar flares that plug into the same Fender amps as Crazy Horse –note the fiery slashes that burst forth part way through “You Are My Face”, also one of Tweedy’s better-penned tracks. For a band that managed to merge commercial success with artistic curiosity, a soft rock album may seem like a retreat. But forget expectation, and open the cellophane on a summery treat.

Dan Deacon

Dan Deacon – Spiderman Of The Rings

Wildly goofy and with the BPM pitch shifted into a warp speed overdrive, Dan Deacon has manufactured the 8-bit rave that Nintendo characters walk away from, sleepy-eyed, on Sunday morning. Magically, he’s synthesized down a barrage of antique electronic influences (Wendy Carlos’s maniacal Moog and Vocoder exploration, the score to first wave arcade shooters like Galaga, and the blistering pacing of the near-forgotten electronic genre Happy Hardcore) into a sum that’s better than its parts. Instantly danceable, “The Crystal Cat” convulses with a ferocious mechanized beat and a helium laced vocals that is more rhythmic than lyrical recognizable. Ten minute hyper epic “Wham City” pops the collar as a call out to his Baltimore collective, and “Big Milk” offers a moment of Gamelan-infused reprieve. But all this supposes you can get past the agitating cackle of Woody Woodpecker and blitzkrieg-beat of the opening track. This is dance music for a new age. Parents, expect to be appalled.

Mavis Staples

Mavis Staples – We’ll Never Turn Back

This decade boasts a cherished moment for soul rediscoveries: old veterans sounding new as Joe Henry’s spotlighted both Solomon Burke and Bettye LaVette, while new debuts like Amy Winehouse retreat into a supposed antiquated Motown sound. Mavis Staples, the front daughter for her father’s family band, The Staple Singers, remerges with assistance of known relic finder Ry Cooder (Buena Vista Social Club) , and a songbook full of Civil Rights Era hymns. As Martin Luther King’s warm up act, The Staples Singers stamped the late 60’s and early 70’s with their brand of gospel soul. We’ll Never Turn Back re-taps this energy, with its passion only increased with the presence of the original vocalists from the SNCC Freedom Singers, as well as Ladysmith Black Mambazo. Shifting between throaty and fiery spiritual sung proclamations (“99 1”) to the hymnal sweetness of self-penned “My Own Eyes”, Mavis’s voice still delivers its loved gritty expression.

Spank Rock

Spank Rock – Fabriclive 33

Erupting from the hyper-digestive Balitorme scene, where anything can be altered for the eager hips of the dance floor (mashed up 80’s pop, Dirty South hip-hop versed over revved up electro and booty shaking Miami Bass and its Brazilian balie funk cousin), Spank Rock take their guilty fun to the UK, spinning live in the London club, Fabric. Track recognition over deep-crate digging sets the play list, as well as wild genre shifts that seem magical in its ingenuity as well as seamlessness. Opening with the hand clap break of Kurtis Blow’s hip hop classic “The Breaks”, the hard bounce sustains into Brazilian dance punk outfit CSS and then loosening into the album’s front third of electronic familiars: Kano, Dominatrix, Yello. Grin-inducing mash-ups sample both Yes and The Romantics, the later flawlessly synthesizing into the electro feminist sound clash of Chicks On Speed. As their first legitimate “above-ground” mixed tape, Spank Rock continue to court your guilty pleasure. Give in.

Blonde Redhead

Blonde Redhead – 23

If there is anything upsetting to previous Blonde Redhead fans, it probably isn’t the loss of its quirky dynamic no-wave roots to its current expression of haunting melodies swirled around Kazu Makino’s echoey siren vocals. To pinpoint any possible dissatisfaction, it may simply resolve around this being Blonde Redhead’s most accessible album. Awash in waves of shoegazey craftsmanship (producer Alan Moulder crafted My Bloody Valentine’s classic Loveless), from the layered shimmering guitars and atmospheric synths to the ethereal dream-inducing sung lyrics, 23 is a dream-pop album of rising helium beauty. However it’s drummer Simone Pace who weighs all these air bits down with a crisp tight groove percussive gravity. It’s the harnessed restraint that keeps everything moving straightforward, from the snappy bop of “Silently” (which recalls the bounce of 2000’s Melody Of Certain Damaged Lemons hit track “In Particular”) to the gentle closer “My Impure Hair.” Magically beautiful to the last note.

Grails

Grails – Burning Off Impurities

With their first release for the post-rock leaning label Temporary Residence (home to such dissonant yet melodically atmospheric entities like Explosions In The Sky and Mono), the Portland-based Grails instrumental sound never feels lacking. With a rich cinematic sense, each track builds upon a hazy, and often Eastern modal, psychedelic intro into muscular propulsive epics. Think of the Doors feeding off the visual contortions and manic instability of Jim Morrison. Now minus Mr. Mojo Risin’s poetic voice, allowing the band the extra room to shift into high tension. It’s this heavy blues backbone, an aggressively amped style birthed by Cream and Black Sabbath, that the Grails inhabit and transform. Ethnic instrumentation, deep bottom bass drum thrusts and steel guitars and violins all color an air that may have you envision the expansive terrain of a spaghetti-Western back dropped against Moroccan architecture. As easily hypnotic as invigorating, the Grails are worth your effort.

Los Straitjackets

Los Straitjackets – Rock En Espanol Volume One
With their identities safely obscured behind lucha libre wrestler masks, Los Straitjackets revive the raw surge of early 60’s instrumental garage bands: the thick bottoms of big beat drums, a feisty bouncing bass, and a pair of attacking, slashing guitars. However, here they’ve donned an additional tactical weapon – lyrics. With a ring corner now flooded with the heavyweight vocal assistance of Cesar Rosas of Los Lobos, the Fly-Rite Boys’ Big Sandy, East L.A. legend Little Willie G, and background harmonies by the Los Lonely Boys, The Los Straitjackets are irresistibly impressive in their Spanish language rock and roll tribute. With much of their focus on early vintage éxitos of Mexican garage acts (Los Teen Tops, Los Rockin’ Devils, etc), the disc is filled with Mexican translations of American hits. But don’t consider this a gimmicky disc of covers. Everything here is heartfelt and reminds you how glorious and wildly fun rock and roll should be.

Florida Funk

Various Artists – Florida Funk
British ears have always been far more appreciative to the trials and sounds of Black America then our present generation. English DJ’s turned collectors have dirtied knees and stained thumbs flipping through the dustiest of dusty 7 inch bins, just to find that rare Maltese Falcon groove. UK label Jazzman now turns its attention to the Deep South after its encyclopedic uncovering of Texas and Midwest funk. Florida, a bordering state to James Brown’s home base of Georgia, harvested a rich heritage of musicianship, partially due to the lively tourists’nightclubs. While national attention during this Civil Right era was still limited, local independent deals and distributions were the norm, and here we see the hefty overview of Florida’s super dynamite soul. With extensive linear notes and photos, you’ll be impressed with the complete sight and sound of this re-issued release. A thick bottomed swampy sound for upcoming hot summer nights.

Berg Sans Nipple

The Berg Sans Nipple – Along The Quai
Instrumental rock should have its own splinter cell within the over-reaching awning of indie rock. Where a band like Tortoise rattles at the edges of an electronic post-jazz world, groups like Godspeed You Black Emperor adapt instrumental rock as their medium for found art, evoking emotion responses rather than head banging hedonism. Enter the duo of Lori Sean Berg (a Frenchie) and Shane Aspegren (Nebraskan) who conjoin as The Berg Sans Nipple to present their own take on voice minimal recordings. With a percussive heavy center, The Berg Sans Nipple wrap their inventions with a veneer that can imply the dub undertones of a hazed-out Lee Scratch Perry to the polyrhythmic synthesize of Afrobeat. From an array of bells, keyboards, drums and drum machines, Berg Sans Nipple craft an album of electronic pop that positions their tentacles across a musical map, encompassing yet never a replica. A true treat.

Grinderman

Grinderman – Grinderman
If rock & roll is to be effective (i.e. disruptive to the elderly & cultural elite), it should feed off the same dense emotion that erupts wildly in puberty, with no concern for billboard status or myspace listens. Nick Cave shoved it in our faces with his 80’s Australian outfit Birthday Party, a noisy aggressive free-form collaboration whose inhospitable sound even today remains modern. 25 plus years later, Cave returns to this twisted explosion of American blues and avant punk, with a fraction of his Bad Seeds (Warren Ellis, Martyn Casey and Jim Sclavunos) keeping time. Luckily he’s frustration has never abated, as in the sexual devoid “No Pussy Blues”, and neither has he’s blistering guitar that slashes all over “Depth Charge Ethel.” This is a return to the punch, though a couple harrow hell dirges remain (“Man In The Moon”) to satisfy the moody Bad Seed fan. Defiantly, Cave enters fifty years with irascible and volcanic form.

Arcade Fire

Arcade Fire - Neon Bible (Merge)
With their second release, Neon Bible, Arcade Fire returns with their massive anthemic indie rock orchestration, colored with church pipe organs, a Hungarian choir, and enough brass to arm a military parade. Where their previous album navel-gazed at the tension swirling within their community (Funeral took its title from the passing of several family members), Neon Bible directs a bitter eye outward, peeking out from under the limiting black veil. Not that Neon Bible is a torturous affair of doom and gloom. Their dark cloud of melancholy is encapsulated by regal crescendos that topple over into complete grandiose stadium-filling boisterousness. From the early surge of opener “Black Mirror” and “Keep The Car Running” to the Springsteen vocalized “(Antichrist Television Blue)”, Neon Bible revives the lesson of album listening over single shuffling. While it may not captivate as instantly as their debut, each repeated consumption rewards with Arcade’s Fire-brand of triumphant theatrics.

Antibalas

When Fela Kuti merged the rhythmic groove of James Brown to his native country's Highlife sound, this was only part of the equation to a sound that still churns dance floors in hour long sweaty exhaustive delight. His legendary status revolved around uniting this intoxicating music with a political backbone explicitly concerning worldwide oppression. Taking this cue, Brooklyn-natives Antibalas are four records deep into inversing the infamous Funkadelic mantra: free your ass and your mind will follow. Their latest album Security keeps strong with their thick groove-laden mixture of blaring horns, propulsive polyrhythmic percussions, and guitar and keyboards punctuating like drums. What's new here is the arrival of the delicate ear of producer/mixer/multi-instrumentalist John McEntire (Tortoise, Stereolab). The addition of McEntire’s post-rock/jazz-fusion pedigree is utilized in tightening the complex orchestra arrangements, but now shined with swimmy electronic flutter and crisper production, adding the sparkling exotic twine to what is already a rich tapestry.

David Karsten Daniels

David Karsten Daniels – Sharp Teeth
While the gnashing teeth of the album cover may be offsetting, David Karsten Daniels album broods only in lyricism: an uncertainty in human relationships and religious ambiguity, the day time nightmares of an metaphysical mind. Or maybe that far too deep. Either way, what he has captured on his Sharp Teeth is rich with majestically arrangements and instrumentation that suggests his study of composition and free improvisation. With a crooning emotive timbre, he digs into each song with a simple opening approach, until the color of orchestration transform them into more fascinating structures. The bee humming strings on "Minnows" build until its clamorous release, exhaling a chorus of voices, cymbal crashes and upper register guitar picking. "I saw Jesus and the Devil, they looked just the same," he quips, turning the phrase into a song of understandable religious questioning. From start to finish, a worthy album waiting for discovery.

Kings Of Leon

Kings Of Leon – Because Of The Time
Mama, hide your daughters. These wayward sons of a preacher man return, opening their third full length with a seven-minute slow boiling thumper entitled "Knocked Up", and then outfit the album with twelve more nuggets of muscular greasy rock. From the Southern roots of their Kentucky upbringing, The Kings Of Leon could easily shadow puppet the long hair gospel of the Allman Brother, a sound that filled much of their ear-catching debut. On "Because Of The Time" however, there is an expansive growth in the sheer size of their sound and influences. "Charmer" catches Caleb Followill gravely drawl inflected into biting yelps a la the Pixies’ Black Francis, while "My Party" adds punching drum rolls and angular attacking guitars to the post-punk leanings of Gang Of Four. Now armed with a stadium filling loudness (thank touring partner U2), The Kings Of Leon indulge in this new slickness with gusto.

Neil Young

Neil Young – Live At Massey Hall 1971
This year sees the arrival of what numerous Neil Young fans have buzzed
and clamored about for decades: the opening of Shakey's archival vaults. This second live release follows the first by months, and spotlights Neil Young under the lights of Toronto's Massey Hall in 1971, alone, shifting between his emotional and intricate guitar strumming and less acknowledged skilled piano playing. Preceding the arrival of what would become his biggest commercial release, 1972's Harvest, the audience (and now us) are treated to the earliest performances of what become future standards: Old Man, A Man Needs A Maid, Heart Of Gold, plus six more tracks that found their debut on this night. With a voice that could be as fragile and as clear as a thin pane of glass, the acoustics captured are unbelievable clean, outclassing possibly any bootleg in existence previous to this. A definite must have new and young fans alike.

I'm From Barcelona

I’m From Barcelona – Let Me Introduce My Friends
From the first exuberant burst of this Swedish ensemble’s debut (sorry, no lispy Spaniards here), you’ll hear sunshiny harmonization, the plinking of a toy piano, and the massive lift off of an indie-pop symphony that counts 29 heads as members. With cheerfully good spirited choruses and lyrics that eye the mundane with childlike spectacles - tree houses, stamp collecting, and chicken pox all serving as stimulus- you’ll very well bop your way to the closest playground or soda jerk with the widest smile. But this is more than a kid’s summer camp creation. With the big hat positioned atop of ring leader / songwriter Emanuel Lundgren head, he’s crafted an enthusiastic full length, surging with rousing horn blares, cinematic enriching strings, a galvanizing youthful choir, and kazoos even. With impeccable duty, I’m From Barcelona delivers an album gorgeous in arrangement and production, and constrained to a perfect 40 minute mark that’s instantly replayable.