Reviews

Album Review: Craig Finn – Clear Heart Full Eyes

You know how every Hold Steady song begins with frontman Craig Finn telling a story over slowly building guitar riffs, before the band explodes into an epic, sing-along hook? Now imagine that minus the epic explosion. That’s Finn’s solo album, Clear Heart Full Eyes in a nutshell.

Album Review: First Aid Kit – The Lion’s Roar

Releasing their sophmore album, The Lion’s Roar, this sister duo from Sweden grabs attention quickly with plucky guitar and standard folk harmonies, but it is their vocals that isolate themselves and ultimately demand attention.

Album Review: Nada Surf – The Stars are Indifferent to Astronomy

Nearly two decades in the game, Nada Surf have proven that they’re solid pop songwriters, and these are truly, undeniably solid pop songs.

Album Review: Chairlift – Something

Chairlift’s Caroline Polachek and Patrick Wimberly explore new ideas without losing their identity, crafting a lovely album in the process.

THEESatisfaction announce LP: awE NaturalE

New Sub Pop signees, THEESatisfaction popped up on our radar in early 2011 with their smooth, soulful DIY throwbacks. Since then, the ladies of THEESatisfaction, Stasia Irons and Catherine Harris-White…

Odd Future Announce New The OF Tape Album

Frank Ocean’s debut album is expected this Spring. Tyler, The Creator will follow up Goblin with Wolf, also in Spring. Mellowhype has a new one called Numbers out “soon”, too.…

Album Review: Trailer Trash Tracys – Ester

With their debut Ester, Trailer Trash Tracys find that invisible median between analog and digital. How do they do it?

Album Review: The Internet – Purple Naked Ladies

A sound engineer with an ear for an eclectic mix, Syd tha Kid takes a complex network of rhythms and intonations and breaks them down to bite-sized nuggets of lush sonic chocolate.

Album Review: The Big Pink – Future This

After nearly three years we finally get a taste of what’s next from The Big Pink, and it sounds like they’re stuck in neutral behind the very formidable Mack truck they thrust in motion with their masterful debut.

Review: The Weeknd – Balloon Trilogy

I tend to bristle at the indie blogosphere’s obsession with taxonomy, the impulse to create ridiculous subgenres that group artists under arbitrary categories. But Eric Harvey got it right when he coined the term “PBR&B.”

New Album: Miike Snow – Happy To You

Swedish pop trio, Miike Snow – who brought us inescapable earworms like “Animal” and “Silvia” in 2009 – are coming back this March with their sophomore LP, Happy To You.

Album Review: Common – The Dreamer / The Believer

On his ninth studio album, Common is front and center, handling the spotlight with the same hungry humility he’s held on to all these years.

The Magnetic Fields New Love At The Bottom of the Sea LP

The Magnetic Fields will drop their tenth (you read that right) record, Love at the Bottom of the Sea, on March 6th, and we’re excited.

The Shins Announce New Album: Port of Morrow

The band that changed our lives, The Shins, will return with a new album in March through James Mercer’s Aural Apothecary.

New Album: Spiritualized – Sweet Heart, Sweet Light

Spiritualized, the English space rock project of Spaceman 3’s Jason Pierce, have taken two years in recording studios from Wales to Los Angeles to finalize their next and seventh record,…