Talk about perfect timing for an album release. L.A. band the Active Set has cautiously released two singles over the last couple of years, but they’ve been waiting to present “11” on just the right date – which is today, Nov. 11, 2011. Their debut also consists of 11 tracks which offer a diverse sound […]
Mika Miko’s demise in 2009 may have left L.A. fans of female punk bands heartbroken, but with former members toting their creativity in to new projects here and there, fresher hooks have risen from the ashes. Reminding the Dum Dum Girls who were here first, sisters Jessica and Jennifer Clavin (along with band members Kevin […]
Today’s unsettling news: One major label buys another major label. Ugh. Black Sabbath to reunite. Ugh. People are still excited about Childish Gambino. Ugh. Doesn’t anybody here have an item that will make me smile? Actually, yes. Imperial Teen is coming back with a new album, its fifth and first since 2007. “Feel the Sound” […]
League’s bio make for a nice story. The project is the transatlantic collaboration between Jorge Ribeiro and José Tornada, whose decided to forgo their college studies in journalism and architecture, live on the beach and, ostensibly with the help of some guitars, effects pedals, keyboards and recording devices, share their blissful pop vision. And “How […]
Sometimes all the knobs, switches, levers and keys collectively yield a sound just as complicated as the set-up. Not so with Oakland-based band James & Evander, who transform typically staccato keys and pedals into a warm, shimmering melodicism that’s a little reminiscent of Dntel/the Postal Service or the One AM Radio without being as twitchy. […]
Music videos have a long history of demanding you suspend your disbelief as artists “sing” while dancing, prancing, falling, fighting and various other manners of play-acting. Pollyn frontwoman Genevieve Artadi takes the art of lip-synching to, er, new heights in the trios’ video for “Sometimes You Just Know.” Directed by Adam Jay Weissman and filmed […]
Bikos sounds like the most fun you can have without getting sponsored at happy hour, or without selling your soul to the synth devil. The Los Angeles art-punks new album “Make Your Sound Sound” binges on the pummeling rhythms and ecstatic licks of the B-52’s, Talking Heads and other bands who made the clamorous glamorous. […]
Happy Wednesday … ‣ M83 and Anthony Gonzalez soar into the Music Box behind their new album “Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming.” Active Child opens the sold-out show. ‣ The Bangles visit the House of Blues behind “Sweetheart of the Sun,” their first album in eight years. ‣ Army Navy brings the bright guitar pop on […]
L.A.’s Carl Jordan, who releases music under the moniker The Western States Motel, offers another indie pop gem of a single that intertwines a bit of twang, a magnitude of synthesizers and simple but poignant melodies. However, like the rest tracks off of his new album “Freeway Freeway Riverbed,” the charming intricacies of “All the […]
Chicago quartet JC Brooks & the Uptown Sound make rambunctious old-school soul that, like revivalists such as Fitz & the Tantrums and Black Joe Lewis & the Honeybears, is as heavy on the pop hooks and punky edges as it on the grooves. The four-piece has been heating up in its hometown, and even performed […]
