We’re pretty sure there’s a big vault filled with catchy choruses somewhere that only certain people can access. Does it require a deal with the devil? A vowel-less password? Certain fashionable attire? Beat Club barged in somehow; when we introduced the L.A. trio last June, we had only a demo of “Something Better” (we’ve now […]
The Veils have been transporting listeners to dark places, and sometimes back, since 2004’s “The Runway Found.” Through various lineup changes, lightning bolts of inspiration and assorted transcontinental travel, songwriter Finn Andrews has shown himself to be capable of arms-waving hope and fist-clenching despair, and the first single from the the quintet’s fourth album “Time […]
The mind is a powerful thing, right? The subjects of Western Scene’s “testing” in the video for the band’s single “Listening” take it to another place. The song is the first single by lab-coasted conspirators Tom Pritchard and Jason Burkhart, whose explorations in electro-tinted indie-rock began last year. The idea for the video originated with […]
Ex-Mellowdrone main man Jonathan Bates unveiled his experimental project Big Black Delta two springs ago, wielding a ferocious light saber (well, actually, today’s laptop technology) to transform 1980s influences into music that makes you feel as if you have four ears. His limited-released “BBDLP1” was one of our favorite albums of 2011, although it turns […]
The Record Company’s sweat-’n’-booze blues has found an ardent following in Chris Vos’ adopted home of Los Angeles. The Wisconsin-bred singer guitarist and bandmates Alex Wood and Marc Cazorla have released an EP of originals, an EP of covers and, improbably, induced Silver Lake crowds to dance and sing along to Freddy Cannon’s “Tallahassee Lassie,” […]
With a name like Wampire, the Portland-based band was bound to have some type of sound with an eerie Transylvanian sheen, and the haunting organ follows suit within the first few measures. Appropriately titled “The Hearse,” Rocky Tinder and Eric Phipps’ 7-inch single from their forthcoming debut is a morbid pop single that’s off-kilter as […]
The fusillade of synths and beats on the new EP from Glow Marrow is no reason to duck and cover. On the contrary, it’s best to let them just wash over you, parse their intricacies and accelerate your world. The L.A. duo of Derek Coburn and Darin Green, pals since they were wee lads in […]
All those jangling, rapturously harmonized guitars on the new Fonda album “Sell Your Memories” can make you feel as if you’re flying. Or just twirling slowly, as the languid number “She Is Real” does. Director David Butow sequences cityscapes, cloudscapes and images of personal escapes to accompany the boy/girl musings of David Klotz and Emily […]
If you fell in love with Fitz & the Tantrums in 2009 for their retro charm, your heart might ache a little bit over the L.A. outfit’s new single “Out of My League.” As frontman Michael Sean Fitzpatrick indicated in the interview we published last week, the band’s new music fast-forwards to the 1980s on […]
What? There’s a new Postal Service song, you say? The long-dormant collaboration between Benjamin Gibbard and Jimmy Tamborello awakens from its slumber this spring with reunion shows – and the 10-year anniversary re-release (on April 9, via Sub Pop) of their album “Give Up.” On the release, there are two new songs, each featuring jenny […]
