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A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the “Just Business” LP by Bass Drum of Death. Even upon one’s first play through Bass Drum of Death’s fourth album, listeners will quickly be able to note that its title is a complete fucking misnomer. Nothing about this album is “Just Business”; it’s impossible to not take this music personally because it is that good and does mark a spectacular potential turning point for the band. Simply put, “Just Business” rocks...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Goodbye Sunshine Hello Nighttime LP by Family Of The Year. It’s funny how, as similar to one another as every Family Of The Year has been to date, Goodbye Sunshine Hello Nighttime feels like a significant departure and/or move forward for the band. That Goodbye Sunshine Hello Nighttime is the group’s first album for Reprise after enjoying a celebrated 2LP+1EP stretch at Nettwerk is irrelevant – Family Of The Year has...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Go Farther In Lightness 2LP by Gang Of Youths. For the nearly half-century since the genre’s inception now, one of the few steadfast foundations upon which punk rock has stood has been nihilism. Consistently, the spirit of punk has been one of “Fuck it all – strip the music down to the barest essentials and get emotionally dark and bleak – at least that way we’ll all beat the world at...

Without intending to overstate the point, what a year 2017 was. Throughout the last twelve months, the world has seen the most unlikely turn which brought power to President Donald Trump, mourned the loss of such fantastic musicians as Tom Petty, Chris Cornell and Chuck Berry, and saw an absolutely tremendous amount of new and exciting music appear on new release racks. Fans were absolutely awe-struck As some bands revisited their catalogues and capitalized on the recent renewed interest in...

Eagles Of Death Metal Nos Amis (Our Friends) (Blu Rae) (Shout Factory/HBO Documentary Films) I should confess that I delayed reviewing Nos Amis for as long as I could, before I say anything else in this review. The reason for that was almost entirely personal; during the release cycle for Heart On (EODM’s sophomore album), I had the good fortune of getting to interview and to know singer/guitarist Jesse Hughes – about as well as any journalist gets to know...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the “Best Of The Best” b/w “45” seven inch single by Roadside Bombs. It’s pretty uncommon for a punk band to publicly praise a music journalist (not that it never happens, just that it doesn’t happen regularly) so when Roadside Bombs doesn’t just praise a critic, they put his face on the A-side of a single and publicly promote him as being “The Best of The Best,” it begs attention.The critic in...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the 2LP edition of Legacy by David Bowie. On the surface, the existence of Legacy – the newest compilation of the greatest hits from David Bowie’s songbook – likely comes off as a little confusing. The set arrived almost two years to the day after Nothing Has Changed (a.k.a. The greatest hits comp which was curated by the artist himself) and, name-for-name, features a very, very (very – it’s about 75% the...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the We Are Busy Bodies released, 2LP reissue of Make A Pest A Pet by Age Of Electric. First, it’s important to point out that this new reissue of Make A Pest A Pet – the third and final album by Age Of Electric before the band went on its first hiatus – marks the first occasion whereupon the album has been released on vinyl. Before now, MAPAP was available on CD,...

Mastodon Emperor Of Sand (Reprise/Warner) After having spent the last few years stretching stylistically in a few different directions (The “White Walker” single found a home as the lead track for a season of HBO’s Game Of Thrones, 2014’s Once More ‘Round The Sun say the band get leaner and almost blurring the lines between metal and punk rock a bit), there’s something refreshing and exciting about the fact that Mastodon has made a glorious return to the sort of...

While I heard a lot of people complain that 2016 was a really poor year for rock and all its associated sub-genres (punk, hardcore, hard rock, stoner rock, metal et c.), the only thing I can assume is that those critics simply weren’t listening. In fact; picking out just ten great albums this year was nearly fucking impossible; doing so forced me to leave out many albums, those by Fat White Family, Dandy Warhols, XIXA and Pup among them. It...