Playlist: New Releases 03.27.07
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Album: Small Sails - Similar Anniversaries
Small Sails (formerly known as Adelaide) are a Portland, OR instrumental band that are a fusion of electronic atmospherics and indie folk pop (folktronica?)... oh, and film as well. You can't see it in this form, but the band also creates visuals ranging from plowed daisies to kids jumping rope in conjunction with the music. You don't really need the film, however, to appreciate the subtle magic happening here though. Download: "Somnambulist"
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Album: The Fall - Reformation Post TLC
When I say this new album from The Fall is a mess, I don't mean it like the usual charming mess filled with post-punk bliss, but a real honest-to-goodness- hard-to-find-meat-from-the-grizzle mess. Legend has it that on their last North American tour, Mark E Smith (and his wife/keyboardist Eleni Poulou) woke up to find the rest of the band gone. They cobbled together a rhythm section and finshed the tour. This reformed line-up makes up Reformation and was HASTILY recorded soon after. There's still some of Mark E. Smith's brilliance in there, but it feels buried under poor production and half-baked material for the most part.-----------------------------
Album: Kaiser Chiefs - Yours Truly, Angry Mob
Love the title, just wish the rest of the album was as inspired. There's nothing immediate like Employment's "I Predict A Riot" to save the album from sounding like color-by-numbers Brit-rock. Ultimately, if you loved their first album you'll probably like this one. I merely appreciated their first one and with Angry Mob, can't generate even that level of (lack of) excitement.Free AOL album stream
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Album: Mika - Life in Cartoon Motion
The fun and catchiness of advance singles "Grace Kelly" and "Love Today" really had my interest piqued for the release of Life in Cartoon Motion. Sure, the Freddy Mercury obsession has been mined before (see The Darkness) but not from a Scissor Sisters-like camp angle. Mika performed "Grace Kelly" on Jay Leno last night, and even though his performance was very Queen (both the band and androgynous glee) he even had macho Pete Rose shaking his hand. Too bad that the album devolves into James Blunt-like blandness after track four.Wincingly bad stuff... gag-inducing ear bile. Stick to the singles mentioned above.
Free AOL album stream (scroll to 10th album)
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More going (or already in) the Sansa
Klaxons - Myths of the Near Future (Review from February) Free AOL album stream
Grant Lee Phillips - Strangelet
Kate Havnevik - Melankton (Free AOL Album Stream)
Walter Kong - Deliver Us From People
Che Arthur - Iron
tags: music, album review, the fall, small sails, kaiser chiefs, mika, klaxons, indie rock, album review, new releases, rhapsody
2 comments:
New Releases 03.27.07
1. Reformation - The Fall
2. The Angry Mob - Kaiser Chiefs
3. Somnambulist - Small Sails
4. Soft Asylum (No Way Out) - Grant-Lee Phillips
5. Travel In Time - Kate Havnevik
6. We Are The Falling Stars - Walker Kong
7. Grace Kelly - Mika
8. Veil - Che Arthur
9. All I Want From You Is Love - Let's Go Sailing
10. Nobody Knows (But I Do) - Mary Weiss
11. Return Of The Mac (Aka New York S***) - Prodigy
12. Put It Down - Redman
13. Okay (Album Version) - Macy Gray
14. Funky Tonight - John Butler Trio
Is that really the cover to the US version of the new Fall? It's godawful, especially compared to the UK version. And consequently, the record is not as bad as you say, it's actually pretty good if you take out the Right Stuff and Das Boat.
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