You can also see the sun glistening off ocean waves in the opening guitar licks of “Slow Days Fast Company,” the new single from L.A. quartet Blonde Summer. It’s been almost two years since Chris Pope and mates released “Eleganza,” a crunchy testament to the fact that ’90s-inclined indie-rock can still sound urgent and fresh. […]
The music of JMSN is pure cinema. It’s the work of 25-year-old songwriter-producer-videographer Christian Berishaj, who has been a proficient user of Pro Tools since the age 12. His debut album “” Priscilla” “ is filled with hypnotic vocals, skeletal instrumentals and enough production sheen to fill a movieplex. With the soul of Little Dragon, and Active […]
It was kind of director Christopher Wilson to speed up the video for the new Band of Horses single “Knock Knock” – from the first note Ben Bridwell and his South Carolina-based quintet can’t wait to get to the next chord. It’s the first taste of Band of Horses’ forthcoming album “Mirage Rock,” due Sept. […]
In its own rather laconic way, the title of Hi Ho Silver Oh’s new album, “Big Rocks,” foreshadows what’s ahead, and it’s not quite the eclectic but harmony-laden folk of their 2009 full-length “Put It All in One Place and Burn It.” Oh, songwriter Casey Trela and his cohorts Jon Mackey and Kevin Manwarren still […]
Saint Motel’s debut album “Voyeur” (out today) is refreshing for what it is not – soul-deadeningly adherent to a currently fashionable genre, or overly mindful of whom some effete reviewer might name-check as musical antecedents. In a way that recalls the early recordings by the Format, “Voyeur” frolics and cavorts, winking knowingly at all the […]
On his solo album “Stomp Out the Sun,” singer-songwriter Jason Diaz established himself as a blues-rock classicist with a clarion, gospel-influenced voice. In his new venture the Tin Drums, Diaz has a foil in singer/lap steel player Anna Beth Carlson. The duo have set course for the wide-open spaces of soulful Americana, and their first […]
U.K. dance-punk outfit Bloc Party are returning with a new album “Four,” out Aug. 21 via Frenchkiss Records. The album was recorded with producer (and former L.A. denizen) Alex Newport, now headquartered in New York City. The video for the palpitation-inducing single “Octopus” – quite possibly the coolest thing we’ve heard from Kele Okereke and […]
It’s been two years [see our 2010 interview] since L.A. has heard from Line & Circle, the anthemic rockers conceived by two Brians (Cohen and Egan) who originally hail from Ohio and sometimes sound like they just sprang from a London club circa 1992. The supporting cast has changed a bit– ex-Aushua mates Eric Neujahr […]
The Faroe Islands, situated in the North Atlantic northwest of Scotland and halfway between Iceland and Denmark, are a long way from Los Angeles – 4821 miles, according to careful research (OK, we Googled). But the folk quartet Marius, hailing from the village of Søldarfjørður, are much closer musically. The band, fronted by singer-multi-instrumentalist Marius Ziska, […]
Alex Brown Church’s songs as Sea Wolf unfold like dog-eared photographs come to life, his pastoral imagery (and equally lush arrangements) not only carrying the weight of nostalgia but the sense that by articulating it his protagonists can somehow free themselves of the burden. So it is with “Old Friend,” the new single from Sea […]
