The sound of the nineties… the raw, rough-and-tumble, ultra-defiant and overly-angsty sound of the nineties…is more than alive in Eugene, Oregon. It is here that garage/alternative quartet Sol Riot has taken shape, going on to take the entire Eugene scene by storm. Recently, the band has released a fresh EP, entitled Start a Riot. Recording right now with Justin Pizzoferrato (Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr.), the group also expects to release its first full-length album, which is…
What’s that old adage? “When you assume, you make an ass out of you and me.” Yeah, well in this case, my assumption didn’t hurt anyone. In hindsight, it was a tad lazy – and perhaps made an ass outta me – but certainly not harmful in any way. Here’s the thing: I got an email from ZME’s esteemed editor and founder Tibi asking me if I’d have any interest in reviewing a book called…
Whenever Animal Collective releases new music, it begs to be analyzed and critiqued. This new release, a two-track 7″ that will likely feature one of their singles off of their upcoming record (Honeycomb) and another track that will probably be a B-side (Gotham), is (thankfully?) far less abstract than their release from earlier this month, Transverse Temporal Gyrus. Yeah, Animal Collective is releasing a lot of new music as of late and it appears that…
Album title: Neck of the Woods Release date: Tuesday, May 8, 2012. Tracks: 11 (you can find the tracklist here) Rating: 9/10 After a good three years and some odd weeks, Los Angeles alternative band Silversun Pickups has released its third true studio album to date, Neck of the Woods…which does just about everything but disappoint. In all honesty, I had no doubt this album would be quite tops,…
HOUSE MUSIC ALL NIGHT LONG ALL NGHT LONG
It may be hard to believe, but Green Day’s Mike Dirnt turns forty years old today. In honor of the iconic bassist hitting the big 4-0 I decided to construct a “ladder” connecting Mr. Dirnt to 1920’s blues powerhouse Bessie Smith. I mean hey, why not have some fun to celebrate a milestone in the life of a member of one of the most fun bands on the planet? Mike Dirnt Any punk fan, or even any serious music fan for…
The Jersey punks are back with the first single from the upcoming fourth record, Handwritten. The band tells Rolling Stone that they “wished to return to the driving punk rock that ignited” their early work. True to their word, the song’s a little heavier (relatively speaking, of course) than anything on 2010’s American Slang. I’d argue that “45” fits between Slang and its predecessor The ’59 Sound, both the album and title track of which…
This is a guest post by Robert Greenberg, author of “How to Listen to Great Music: A Guide to Its History, Culture, and Heart” WE were told as children, “sticks and stones will break your bones but words will never hurt you.” Wrong. In truth, words have the power to inflict tremendous hurt: spiritual, emotional, and intellectual. Among the worst offenders are terms of classification: those handy-dandy words and phrases that allow us lump things together…
This is probably one of the most outlandish things I’ll say for a very long time: I like an American Idol alum, plain and simple. In fact, I just may like her a lot. For those who didn’t tune in to the tenth season of the show, which features perennially unoriginal talent (but talent nonetheless), Haley Reinhart, a Chicago native with an edge, finished third to charming country teens Lauren Alaina and Scotty McCreery. On Idol, Ms. Reinhart left…
I sometimes wonder what it would be like if I didn’t love Beach House. There are surely scores of people out there who can’t stand them. They must be a frustrating band to hate because, well, all their songs take such a uniformly dramatic, florid tone that likely makes detractors want to barf simply because their style is so consistently overwhelming. In the first five seconds of both “Lazuli,” their first official single off of…
Hailie Hay
Steve Lampiris
Mark Steinbach
MusicJay
Alice Smith
Staff