STAFF PICKS

Kimber – Kacy & Clayton
Lindsay – Kacy & Clayton, Rainer Maria, Grizzly Bear
Dario – Kacy & Clayton

THIS WEEK’S NEW RELEASES

Ghostpoet – Dark Days + Canapés CD/LP (PIAS America)
Dark Days + Canapés is Ghostpoet’s most defining album to date. Produced by Leo Abrahams, best known for his work with Brian Eno and Jon Hopkins, it delves even further into a fuller, guitar driven sound. Serendipity and experimentalism were embraced in the studio and several original ideas evolved or were supplanted by something unexpected. On “Freakshow” the addition of manic laughter from a gospel choir, who had turned up to sing on a different track, compounds the crazed nature of the song, whilst “Blind As A Bat…,” influenced by Talk Talk’s Laughing Stock, saw string players invited to improvise with fragments of their performance sampled and overlaid to build something less structured, more wayward and reflective of the state of mind of the protagonist. 


Grizzly Bear – Painted Ruins CD/2xLP+MP3 (RCA)
Grizzly Bear release Painted Ruins, their highly anticipated fifth full-length album and first for RCA Records. The band – Chris Bear, Ed Droste, Daniel Rossen and Chris Taylor – spent the better part of two years writing and recording the 11 new compositions on Painted Ruins. Taylor produced the album and it was mixed by Grammy Award-winning engineer Shawn Everett (Alabama Shakes, The War On Drugs, Weezer). Sessions took place at Allaire Studios in upstate New York and various locations around Los Angeles, including Taylor’s own Terrible Studios. Rolling Stone called the record’s lead single “Three Rings” “spellbinding” while Spin exclaimed that the band “strike gold” with straightforward second single “Mourning Sound.” Painted Ruinsfollows the group’s critical and commercial 2012 breakthrough Shields.


Interpol – Our Love To Admire [Reissue/2007] CD+DVD/2xLP/2xLP+DVD (Capitol)
Digitally remastered 10th Anniversary edition expanded with a DVD featuring their 2007 performance at London Astoria. [Double heavyweight vinyl LP pressing in gatefold jacket including custom inner sleeves also available. Deluxe vinyl edition adds the DVD.]


Kacy & Clayton – The Siren’s Song CD/LP+MP3 (New West)
“When you grow up in a remote region of Saskatchewan, Canada, where the nearest record store is a five-hour drive, an imagination comes in handy. That’s how cousins Kacy Anderson and Clayton Linthicum – aka Kacy & Clayton – coped with life in the Wood Mountain Uplands, where rolling hills outnumbered neighbors and small-town subversion hid in the verdant sheen. And, on their last LP Strange Country, they told tales of vengeful, murderous women, unwanted babies and mysterious spirits, all housed in their breed of both eerie and ethereal folk, unique enough to catch the interest of Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy, who produced their forthcoming album The Siren’s Song. With production from Tweedy, [album single] ‘The Light of Day’ finds the duo morphing into full-band territory, giving their sound a less pastoral, more psychedelic sheen along the lines of Gram Parson’s Grievous Angel, Buffalo Springfield or Sir Douglas Quintet if Linda Perhacs was at the wheel, with Anderson’s voice leaping from a sweet mountain warble to full-on Grace Slick belt.” – Rolling Stone


KMFDM – Hell Yeah CD/2xLP (earMUSIC)
For over a quarter of a century KMFDM is the epitome and synonym for industrial rock. Hell Yeah is their first new album in four years. [Vinyl edition pressed at 45rpm for maximum fidelity.]
 
Shelby Lynne & Allison Moorer – Not Dark Yet CD (Silver Cross)
Not Dark Yet provides a potent look at the sisters’ individual and collective artistry through eclectic song choices from writers ranging from the Louvin Brothers, Nick Cave, Kurt Cobain, and back to Jessie Colter. Shelby and Allison wrap their arms around the past, plant their feet in the present, and nod toward what’s around the bend with the co-written “Is It Too Much” which closes out the ten-song set. [Vinyl edition due September 15.]
 
Dent May – Across The Multiverse CD/LP+MP3 (Carpark)
Following the lead of musical-polymaths-with-LA-ties before him like Brian Wilson, Van Dyke Parks, and Harry Nilsson, Dent May’s style on the magical mystery tour de force Across The Multiverse will be familiar to fans of his previous work. Yet there’s something more refined about this collection… Stately strings mingle with boogie piano like old friends. Synths weave a celestial backdrop throughout. Every verse, bridge and chorus in its right place, giving it the unmistakable feel of a true songwriting craftsman at work. Lyrically Dent has never been sharper, musing on themes like modern romance (“Picture On A Screen,” “Face Down In The Gutter Of Your Love”), existential dread (“Dream 4 Me,” “I’m Gonna Live Forever Until I’m Dead”), and the distance to the moon (“Distance To The Moon”) as he searches for meaning among the infinite scrolling feeds of our 21st century augmented reality. The title track, a duet with Frankie Cosmos, is a deep space love song about finding love beyond impossible boundaries. [Yellow colored vinyl pressing also available.]
 
UNKLE – The Road: Part 1 CD/2xLP (Cooking Vinyl)
After a seven-year hiatus, James Lavelle returns with a new album from UNKLE. The Road: Part 1 is the project’s fifth album to date and long-awaited follow-up to 2010’s Where Did The Night Fall. the album taps into the multicultural landscape of modern London and sets out to unite an eclectic mix of ideas, cultures, and genres under the UNKLE umbrella to create something unique. Lavelle explains, “I wanted to make a record that I hadn’t been able to before, going back to the roots of where I came from, with a foot in modern London.” The lengthy list of contributors includes Queens Of The Stone Age’s Troy Van Leeuwen and Jon Theodore, Primal Scream’s Andrew Innes, The Duke Spirit’s Liela Moss, Dhani Harrison, Keaton Henson, ESKA, and long-time UNKLE collaborator Mark Lanegan.


Yawpers – Boy In A Well CD/LP+MP3 (Bloodshot)
The Yawpers is a rock ‘n’ roll trio from Denver, Colorado. Their name is derived from the Walt Whitman poem Song Of Myself: “I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.” The Yawpers play in a unique setting of two acoustic guitar players and drummer, yet their music is played with raucous glee comparable to seeing a metal band. Their third album, Boy In A Well, sounds like Alan Lomax using his field recorder to capture Mance Lipscomb ripping a laced joint with the Cramps and strapping on their instruments to let it fly. It’s a complex concept album – manically conceived, historically situated, emotionally underscored and set in a plot-driven fictive universe. It’s demented, unpredictable, taboo, ambitious, and yet distinctively cohesive.
 
Audioslave – Audioslave [Reissue/2002] 2xLP+MP3 (Sony Legacy)
Limited 150gm vinyl reissue of Audioslave’s debut album.


DJ Shadow – The Mountain Has Fallen 12”+MP3 (Mass Appeal)
New 4-track EP featuring collaborationsTNas, and Detroit MC Danny Brown.
 
Jerry Garcia – Garcia [Reissue/1972] LP (ATO)
Limited blue colored vinyl LP pressing. Originally released in 1972, Garcia is Jerry Garcia’s first solo album and was recorded over a three-week period almost entirely by Jerry with assistance from Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann and lyricist Robert Hunter.


Haim – Something To Tell You 2xLP (Columbia)
Recently released on CD – now available on vinyl. When the time came to record their sophomore album, Haim decided to “go in and record as a band, keeping it a little more organic. That was kind of a mission statement for the album” offered Danielle Haim. The group first announced the release ofSomething To Tell You with an in-studio video version of album track “Right Now,” which was shot and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (Magnolia,Boogie Nights). Haim then released the single “Want You Back,” which Rolling Stone described as having “a Hot 100 ready sheen.” Pitchfork gave “Want You Back” its coveted Best New Track saying “Haim are pulling the rug out from under our feet in the run-up to releasing their second album.” Entertainment Weekly declared “Want You Back” sees HAIM returning to their sonic roots as a funky, pop-inspired trio, complete with groovy strings, sprightly percussion, a soulful chorus, and a spritz of electronic sheen.”
 
Calvin Harris – Funk Wave Bounces Vol. 1 LP (Sony)
Recently released on CD – now available on vinyl. Calvin Harris’ new album features the previously released singles “Slide” featuring Frank Ocean & Migos, plus “Heatstroke” featuring Young Thug, Pharrell Williams & Ariana Grande. The album boasts 19 guest artist collaborations including Frank Ocean, Travis Scott, Kehlani, Future, Pharrell Williams, Katy Perry, Big Sean, John Legend, Khalid, Migos, Schoolboy Q, Ariana Grande, Young Thug, D.R.A.M., Nicki Minaj, Lil Yachty, Jessie Reyez, Partynextdoor plus Snoop Dogg.
 
Ida – Will You Find Me [Reissue/2000] 2xLP+MP3 (Polyvinyl)
Deluxe double-LP in expanded packaging, including a gatefold jacket and lyric insert. “Will You Find Me is sad, pretty, hope-filled, exquisitely crafted, and utterly haunting” (Will Hermes, Entertainment Weekly). “[The songs on Will You Find Me are] like the whispers of uncertain lovers in a perpetual dance of vulnerability and assurance, parting and reconciliation” (The New York Times).
 
Mike Krol – Mike Krol Is Never Dead: The First Two Records 2xLP+MP3 (Merge)
On Mike Krol Is Never Dead: The First Two Records, we catch up—with the past, that is. Indeed, Turkey, released in 2015, is Chapter 3 of the Krol saga; here, finally, are its long-lost predecessors. Self-released in 2011, vinyl 10” I Hate Jazz was the opening salvo of World War Krol. Only 500 copies were pressed; they were given away to anyone who showed interest (and many who showed none whatsoever). Including Krol classics like “Fifteen Minutes” and “Like A Star,” the record has long been unavailable. His second vinyl 10” Trust Fund followed in 2013; its 500 copies sold out on the ensuing tour, fueling a mini-mania that would elevate it to cult status. This set includes both records on freshly pressed Merge vinyl; an illuminating selection of digital outtakes, demos, and B-sides; and a fold-out poster showcasing a selection of Mike Krol ephemera.


Lil Yachty – Teenage Emotions LP (Quality Control Music, LLC)
Released late last May on CD – now available on vinyl. Teenage Emotions merges Lil Yachty’s signature gleeful sing-rap and auto-tuned transmissions with hip-hop bombast, pop and ‘80s cultural touchstones. The 19-year-old Atlanta native is proudly genre-defying, mining hip-hop, alternative, indie sounds as well as his hometown Atlanta trap DNA to solidify his mosaic approach. The album features collaborations with Migos, YG, Kamaiyah, Diplo, Grace, Evander Griim and Stefflon Don, with production by WondaGurl, Earl The Pearl, Burberry Perry, Digital Nas, K Swisha, Southside, 30 Roc and others. Limited pink vinyl pressing.
 
Randy Newman – Dark Matter LP (Nonesuch)
Recently released on CD – now available on vinyl. Dark Matter, Randy Newman’s first album of new material in nine years, is the follow-up to 2008’s acclaimed Harps And Angels, which the Guardian called “the work of a true master of popular song.” Produced by long-time Newman collaborators Mitchell Froom, Lenny Waronker, and David Boucher, Dark Matter includes songs about Vladimir Putin, the Kennedy brothers, Sonny Boy Williamson, science vs. religion, love and loss, and more.
 
Rainer Maria – Rainer Maria LP+MP3/Cassette (Polyvinyl)
Rainer Maria have returned in full force with a brand new self-titled full-length written and recorded by all three founding members. Frequently hailed as a pioneering band in the Midwestern DIY scene, Rainer Maria got back together in 2015 after a decade-long hiatus and has been playing shows ever since. Inevitably, the next step in the reunion was to produce new music.

 

 

NEXT WEEK’S NEW RELEASES

QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE – Villains CD/LP/indie exclusive LP
WAR ON DRUGS –  Deeper Understanding CD/LP
EMA – Exile In The Outer Ring CD/LP
FILTHY FRIENDS – Invitation CD/LP (Corin Tucker, Peter Buck, Kurt Bloch, Scott McCaughey)
THEE OH SEES – Orc CD/LP
CAGE THE ELEPHANT – Unpeeled LP colored
TY SEGALL – Fried Shallots 12″
CHRIS FORSYTH + SOLAR MOTEL BAND – Dreaming In The Non-Dream CD/LP
GIANT DOG – Toy CD/LP
GOGOL BORDELLO – Seekers + Finders CD/LP
HAMMOCK – Mysterium CD/LP
LILLY HIATT – Trinity Lane CD
IRON AND WINE – Beast Epic CD/LP 
NICK LOWE – Nick Lowe + His Cowboy Outfit CD/LP
NICK LOWE – Rose Of England CD/LP
ROLLING BLACKOUTS COASTAL FEVER – Talk Tight CD/LP
SUPERCHUNK – Self-Titled CD/LP
TERA MELOS – Trash Generator CD/LP
RICHARD THOMPSON – Acoustic Classics 2 CD/LP
TOGETHER PANGEA – Bulls + Roosters CD/LP
GRIEVES – Running Wild CD/LP
OLAFUR ARNALDS – Eulogy For Evolution CD/LP
TOBACCO – Ripe + Majestic CD/LP
VARIOUS – Soul Of An Nation: Afro Centric Visions In The Age CD/LP
HANK WILLIAMS – Alone + Foresaken:The Demos CD/LP
GORDI – Reservoir CD/LP
DAVID RAWLINGS – Poor David’s Almanack LP
TRANS AM – LP reissues
WIDOWSPEAK – Expect The Best CD/LP
MYNABIRDS – Be Here Now CD/LP