Feel as if you’re trapped in a place as large and sprawling and multi-faceted as Los Angeles? Local quartet Spirit Vine’s new album “Ascender” – finally out this week via Manimal Vinyl – articulates your neurosis on its single “City Daze.” “L.A. haunts you / L.A. haunts you,” singer Jaquelinne Cingolani wails over sheaths of […]
Recent Sunset Strip honoree Joan Jett has returns with “Unvarnished,” her 14th album and first in seven years with the Blackhearts. And as her first music video for the song “Any Weather” suggests, she’s not going anywhere just yet. She may already have a lifetime of achievements, but Jett moves forward with one of her […]
It’s been a minute, Warpaint. Never ones to work quickly, the L.A. quartet of singer-guitarists Emily Kokal and Theresa Wayman, bassist-singer Jenny Lee Lindberg and drummer Stella Mozgawa were around several years before their first EP (2008) and finally released their widely praised full-length “The Fool” three years ago this month. Today Warpaint announced that […]
Structurally, a lot of Mirror Talk’s EP sounds like somebody moved into a mansion once owned by Depeche Mode and, rather than just rearrange the furniture, gave the place a facelift. The L.A. quartet of Court Alexander, Steven Lopez, Sean Krell and Dave Lewis, dispenses big swatches of New Wave that recall the best of […]
Back in January 2012, we introduced Miracle Days, the indie-pop collaboration between Edson Choi and Dre Babinski, both whom played in the now-defunct Dusty Rhodes & the River Band. They had made some recordings the previous fall in Dr. Dog’s Philadelphia studio and an album release seemed imminent. But the recordings needed tweaking and possible […]
The Last were pop-punk before you were. Formed in Hermosa Beach around the time a certain peanut farmer was elected President of the United States, the quartet built around the brotherly alliance of Joe, Mike and David Nolte made a brand of irascible power-pop that, for all its attitude and sharp edges, wasn’t quite as […]
The dynamic duo of modern-funk ambassador Dâm-Funk and G-funk godfather Snoopzilla, née Snoop Dogg, have teamed for a new project entitled 7 Days of Funk, with a self-titled EP out on Dec. 10 via Stones Throw Records. Snoop’s newest moniker, following his reggae turn as Snoop Lion, is drawn in reverence to Parliament-Funkadelic’s bass player […]
In July, we reported that L.A. shoegazers Tennis System had a new album in the works. But then this happened: Frontman Matty Taylor teamed up with DJ/club promoter Michael Stock of Part Time Punks for a new EP. Stock, as any local devotee of shoegaze/post-punk/darkwave/twee-pop (and assorted flavors) should know, is a KXLU radio host […]
Mansions on the Moon’s electro-pop is so sleek you can almost see your reflection in it. But in no way should that imply that MOTM’s new EP “Full Moon” is as predictable, or as predictably vacuous, as much of the indie-pop elbowing for room in the marketplace. The five songs from the quartet of Ted […]
Pop starlet Sky Ferreira has been working on her debut album for quite some time, and the release of “Night Time, My Time” finally arrives Oct. 29 via Capitol Records. As a follow-up to her 2012 hit “Everything Is Embarrassing,” Ferreira fans have gotten the Ariel Rechtshaid-produced “You’re Not the One,” an ’80s-leaning breakup anthem. So […]
