STAFF PICKS

kimber – sherwood at the controls comp
lindsay – stephen steinbrink, hannah georgas
dario – stephen steinbrink, jeff parker
jeff – stephen steinbrink, dj shadow

THIS WEEK’S NEW RELEASES
AugustinesThis Is Your Life CD (PIAS America)
“Despite our constant collective quest for The New, we’ll always return to those musicians who imbue their work with only themselves, vulnerability and popularity be damned. On This Is Your Life, Augustines continue to mine adversity for glimmers of hope. There’s more of an electronic presence and more influence drawn from outside the indie-rock sphere, but it remains resolutely an Augustines record. If you’ve been on the fence about the band thus far, this isn’t going to change your mind, but they continue to grow in sound and scope, with each LP bringing bigger ambitions and production that could comfortably be labelled bombastic. With each record the band releases, they inch further from the tragedy and pain that initially threatened to define them. It’s still there, but sits comfortably alongside thankful depictions of events which led them to this point. No longer having to scream to be heard, they’re able to imbue their music with the elegance necessary to create the truest representation of its message: it’ll be okay” – Drowned In Sound. [Vinyl edition due July 8.]


The Avett Brothers True Sadness CD (Republic)
Seth Avett says that True Sadness is a patchwork quilt, both thematically and stylistically. Wherein a myriad of contrasting fabrics make perfect sense on the same plane, the album draws upon countless resources from its writers and performers. He cites pervasive and cornerstone influences such as Queen, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Jimmie Rodgers, Tom Petty, Nine Inch Nails, Gillian Welch, Aretha Franklin, Walt Disney, Pink Floyd, Kings Of Convenience, calypso of the 1950s and country of the 1930s. Most importantly, he assures, “Throughout the album, we stitched together the boldest red and the calmest green, polka dots and stripes, the roughest denim and the smoothest velveteen. They came together because they are the best patterns we have and because each of us brought our own fabric to the quilting frame.”


Claudia Quintet Super Petite CD (Cuneiform)
Ostensibly the Claudia Quintet is a jazz band, with the music on Super Petite ranging from the frantic deconstructed bebop of “Philly” to the appropriately dreamy “Nightbreak.”


DeerhoofThe Magic CD/LP+MP3/Cassette (Polyvinyl)
“Deerhoof’s never-look-back aesthetic has become a calling card, and its unpredictability a point of pride. Time and again, the San Francisco band has surprised listeners and pushed them in new musical directions they might not immediately want to go, and yet it’s hard not to loyally follow along with each sonic jump. Still, when a group has churned through as many bizarro ideas as Deerhoof has over the course of a brilliant run of albums that date back to the mid-1990s, you have to wonder how it keeps coming back with something different.To follow up 2014’s excellent La Isla Bonita, Deerhoof’s members ditched the comforts of a traditional studio, rented a sterile abandoned office in the New Mexico desert and, with nothing written beforehand, just played. Seven days later, Deerhoof reemerged with its 14th album, The Magic, an eclectic 15 songs inspired by the music each member — vocalist and bassist Satomi Matsuzaki, guitarists and multi-instrumentalists Ed Rodriguez and John Dieterich, and drummer Greg Saunier — grew up loving.More than just the sound of loud, off-kilter textures colliding, The Magiccaptures a love for pop melody that provides a perfect antidote to the dissonance, with songs that are as catchy as they are noisy” – NPR. [Limited purple color vinyl pressing also available.]


DJ ShadowThe Mountain Will Fall CD/2xLP+MP3 (Mass Appeal)
“Josh Davis, aka DJ Shadow, has been relatively quiet, having been on tour since 2014’sThe Liquid Amber EP, and his last proper full-length was The Less You Know, The Better, which came out in 2011. But it seems the time away has served him well, as he’s come back more confident in the announcement of his new album The Mountain Will Fall. The producer told Pitchfork: ‘Sometimes records are a struggle. This record, I knew exactly what I wanted to get across.’ The new album’s title is a hint at revisiting and besting his seminal classic Endtroducing 20 years after its release. The couple of years he spent touring on DJ gigs, returning to the tactile familiarity of his decks has inspired the look back while pushing forward featuring the likes of labelmateRun The Jewels.The first foray into the new album is the opening title track. It’s a slow-building, slow-winding joint that churns bouncy synths, off-time-on-purpose drums, and big, lingering atmospheric sweeps together for a slight scoring feel. The track oscillates, swelling into a huge moment in the middle and dissipating into subdued intricacy. This first indication is nice step toward Shadow returning to classic form.” –Stereogum


The Felice Brothers Life In The Dark CD/LP (Yep Roc)
The Felice Brothers return with nine songs in their unique style, a blend of folk, country, rock and soul.


Hannah Georgas– For Evelyn CD (Dine Alone)
Polaris Prize long-listed indie pop artist Hannah Georgas returns with her third full-length effort, For Evelyn. “With each release, the Ontarian has gotten more adventurous with her compositions, playing with syncopations and experimenting with new instrumentations. [Album single] ‘Waste,’ indicates that she’s gone even farther down the rabbit hole. ‘Waste’was originally structured as a piano ballad, but producer Graham Walsh (Holy Fuck) heard something different in the track. He turned the keys into an ’80s cop-show stalker and layered in squealing, funky horns that should make the ears perk up on fans of early Menomena. But for all the track’s hectic, danceable energy, there’s a thread of defeat that still carries over from the original mood of the song. ‘All I really really wanted was to hear from you,’ Georgas sings on the bridge into the chorus. ‘At least I’m more of aware of it now/ At least I know I’ll never ever, never gonna do right in your eyes’” – Consequence Of Sound. [Vinyl edition due July 29.]


Mick HarveyDelerium Tremens CD/LP (Mute)
Some 20 years after first starting to translate French chanson favorite Serge Gainsbourg’s hefty catalogue, Australian outsider Mick Harvey (formerly of The Bad Seeds) releases his third volume of Gainsbourgcovers.


Hot Hot HeatHot Hot Heat CD/LP (Kaw-Liga)
The first studio album in six years from the critically acclaimed Canadian indie rock band.Hot Hot Heat’s style makes use of electronic and traditional instruments and has variously been categorized as dance-punk, post-punk revival, new wave, and art-punk.


Kayo DotPlastic House On Base Of Sky CD/LP (The Flenser)
On Plastic House On Base Of Sky, Kayo Dot fully embraces a variety of synthesizers (many of them vintage analog) to create another work of ambition and magnitude that fuses the explosive musical imagination of a band like Magma with the forward-thinking experimentalism of Conrad Schnitzler or Morton Subotnick.


 
Jeff ParkerThe New Breed CD/LP (International Anthem)
Best known as a multi-instrumental member of Tortoise and a pillar of the Chicago jazz and experimental music scene, Jeff Parker has been very prolific over the last 20+ years. These recordings were conducted to capture composed passages as well as free playing that used Parker’s beats and sample suites as improvisational criterion. After completing seven songs with the band, the last of which with vocals from his daughter Ruby Parker recorded in Chicago by John McEntire, Parker named the project The New Breed (after a clothing store his late father Ernie owned and operated in the ’70s) and finished the album by stitching the band tracks together with intermittent pieces of beat memories from his archive.


Rich RobinsonFlux CD/2xLP (Eagle)
A blues-rock odyssey straight from The Black Crowes guitarist’s soul.


Stephen Steinbrink Anagrams CD/LP (Melodic)
Ex-local Stephen Steinbrink returns with another beautiful album under his own name. “Olympia, WA’s Stephen Steinbrink is back with a new album – he spent the last two years working on it at a retrofitted analogue studio in a lofty, de-sanctified church in the secluded island town of Anacortes, Washington. The result is another gorgeous album full of delicate, airy guitar pop with nods to ‘70s AM radio and The Beach Boys.” – Brooklyn Vegan


ToneAntares CD (Dischord/TminusOneMusic)
Few instrumental bands loom as large as Washington DC’s Tone. Anchored by drummer Greg Hudson and guitarist Norm Veenstra, its lineup of burly dudes always brews an impressive bombast — music that is mammoth and masculine. Tone’s seventh album,Antares, finds the group fit for duty 25 years after it was first formed.


Various Artists Late Night Tales: Olafur Arnalds CD/2xLP+MP3 (Late Night Tales)
Standing at the intersection where techno meets classical music, Olafur Arnalds directs the newest Late Night Talesmix.


Various ArtistsSherwood At The Controls 2 (1985-1990) CD/2xLP (On-U Sound)
In 1984, Adrian met three American musicians who would have a pivotal effect on the future direction his music would take. Collaborating with former Sugarhill Gang members Doug Wimbish, Skip McDonald and Keith LeBlanc resulted in some brilliantly unclassifiable beats-and-sample laden records as Tackhead, with various weird and wonderful off-shoots exploring different permutations of their blueprint. The new sound they developed caught the ear of artists from the industrial scene, resulting in work with the likes of Cabaret Voltaire, Einstürzende Neubauten and Nine Inch Nails. Sherwood also continued to get invitations to put his distinct sonic fingerprint on an eclectic range of music, from African hypno-chant to strange post-punk sound worlds. In 1986 Adrian finally met one of his heroes and key influences: Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry. As well as helping to revive the recording career of the Jamaican legend, it reignited his own passion for dub, represented here by some killer unreleased versions from the On-U vaults.


Various ArtistsSoul Jazz Presents Coxsone’s Music 2: The Sound Of Young Jamaica – More Early Cuts From The Vaults Of Studio One 1959-63 2xCD (Soul Jazz)
Soul Jazz’s latest exploration into the Coxsone vaults yields yet more earthly delights. This time, we go early to the Roots stage: ’59-’63. Featuring early material by Roland Alphonso, Don Drummond, Tommy McCook (all of whom would form The Skatalites), Toots and The Maytals, young singers such as Bob Marley and The Wailers, Delroy Wilson, Owen Gray all captured in their formative days. The music here spans a wealth of styles – Jamaican rhythm and blues, jazz, gospel, proto-ska, Rastafarian – all of which were drawn upon to create the future sounds of Jamaican reggae. [Vinyl edition due July 8.]


We Are ScientistsHelter Seltzer CD/LP (1)
The Brooklyn, NY based power pop troupe return with their fifth album. For Helter Seltzer. We Are Scientists asked their ex-keyboard player Max Hart to produce. Max had just finished a three-year stint as the keyboardist for Katy Perry, choosing as his final gig Ms. Perry’s performance at the 2015 Super Bowl. 


Neil Young Earth 2xCD (Reprise)
Earth features performances of songs from a range of Young’s albums, including last year’s The Monsanto Years, 1990’s Ragged Glory, and 1970’s After The Gold Rush.The audio was captured during Young’s 2015 tour with The Promise Of The Real, fronted by Lukas Nelson (vocals/guitar) and Micah Nelson (guitar, vocals) — Willie Nelson’s sons. A new take on some of Young’s most beloved songs, Earth features the live recordings, along with added musical overdubs, as well as sounds of the earth, such as city sounds like car horns, sounds of insects, and animal sounds from bears, birds, crickets, bees, horses, cows — creating a very strange, yet beautiful atmosphere. [Vinyl edition dueAugust 12.]


Broncho Double Vanity LP (Dine Alone)
Recently released on CD – now available on vinyl.The third album from the Oklahoma quintet takes a more spaced-out and groove-laden vibe only hinted at on previous release,Just Enough Hip To Be Woman.


Sublime40oz. To Freedom [Reissue/1992] 2xLP (Geffen)
SublimeRobbin’ The Hood [Reissue/1994] 2xLP (Geffen)
SublimeSublime [Reissue/1996] 2xLP (Geffen)
SublimeSecond Hand Smoke [Reissue/1997] LP (Geffen)
SublimeAcoustic (Bradley Nowell & Friends) [Reissue/1998] LP (Geffen)
SublimeStand By Your Van (Live) [Reissue/1998] LP (Geffen)
Newly remastered vinyl reissues now available. [Deluxe editions of 40oz. To Freedom,Robbin’ The Hood, and Sublime are also available — each featuring a removable 3D lenticular cover.]


Jim WhiteNo Such Place [Reissue/2001] LP (Luaka Bop)
2001’s No Such Place, Jim White’s sophomore LP, is a collection of whimsical tall tales set to music. It’s not unlike his debut of four years prior, Wrong-Eyed Jesus, only bigger, darker, and weirder. A look back at 43 years of life-in-Technicolor, the disc is suitably all over the map, at times recalling Tom Waits at his most evocative, Neil Young at his most emotive, and PJ Harvey at her most desperate.

 

NEXT WEEK’S NEW RELEASES
BAT FOR LASHES – Bride CD/LP
JAMES BLAKE – Colour In Anything CD/LP
THEE OH SEES – Life In SF CD/LP
SUICIDE – LP reissues
DURAND JONES + THE INDICATIONS – Self-Titled CD/LP
NOBODY – Prodigal Son LP
SARA WATKINS – Young In All The Wrong Ways CD/LP
KATE & ANNA MCGARRIGLE – Pronto Monto CD
THE FALL – Dragnet LP reissue
THE FALL – Live At Witch Trials LP reissue
GOGGS – Self-Titled CD
MELVINS – Basses Loaded LP
MODERAT – Running 10″
BLINK 182 – California LP
THURSDAY – Kill The House Lights LP

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