A deeper look at the grooves pressed into Hunting Lions’ Dark EP. While I can’t keep myself from wondering why Hunting Lions elected to keep the music on the Dark EP contained to just one side of this 12” (there’s five songs on one side and a graphic on the other), there is no question that the songs on this EP are excellent. In addition, it is pretty nice that the record needs no flipping to get the full experience...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the “Berliner Pilsner” 7” by C.C. Voltage. Prior to hearing the “Berliner Pilsner” 7” single, I confess that I had never heard any of C.C. Voltage’s music before but, after hearing these two songs, I feel like I know him. More than that, hearing the “Berliner Pilsner” 7” really takes me back to a different time; a time when when rock had a certain undeniable swagger and a kind of distortion which...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Kepi and Friends – Full Moon Forever LP by Kepi Ghoulie. After having already reviewed Kepi Ghoulie’s “other” album released this year (the Ramones In Love LP), I can say with regret that I approached Ghoulie’s output this annum in the wrong order. Full Moon Forever is a really good album which features covers of songs by bands like The Cure, Iggy Pop, Nick Cave, The Cars and the Jesus and...
The Strokes The Singles Volume 1 (Legacy Recordings/Sony Music) The Strokes might be singlehandedly responsible for bringing the alternative renaissance of 2000-2010 to the masses. Don’t know what I’m talking about? Well, in that decade, there was a kind of rock music style (not necessarily new) that, for a lack of better term, was becoming more mainstream. That era saw the ascent of bands like Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Interpol, LCD Soundsystem (to a lesser degree), The White Stripes, and The...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Ill-Fated Cusses LP by Cheater Slicks. After the last couple of decades (basically, from 1996 forward) which have seen the release of a multitude of great albums recorded with digital platforms (like ProTools, for example), it’s refreshing to hear a band just plug in, put microphones in front of amplifiers and record their songs – straight, no chaser. That’s precisely what Cheater Slicks did for their new album, Ill-Fated Cusses; for...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Blood Money Part 0 LP by Dope. While the sequence in which the parts of Blood Money are supposed to play is a little unclear (that this LP is numbered part zero implies it’s supposed to be a prequel to Blood Money Part 1 – which was released in 2016 – and while the last song on this album is numbered 13 on the back cover, there are only twelve cuts...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Street Sermons LP by Daddy Long Legs. It’s funny how an album cover is capable of getting the gears to begin running in a listener’s mind and cause them to begin drawing conclusions and/or forming expectations of the music before they even hear a note. In the case of Daddy Long Legs’ debut album, Street Sermons, the image on the album’s cover sort of cross a couple of wires; the black...
Michael Jackson Thriller (40th Anniversary Exclusive) LP (Legacy Recordings/Sony Music) There is absolutely nothing I can say about this album that hasn’t been said a hundred times already, so let me just tell a personal story about the musical power of Michael Jackson, instead. The documentary Leaving Neverland had just come out which told two very personal stories of children who were victims of Michael Jackson’s abuses. The documentary got lots of coverage and further brought to people’s attention what...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Ramones In Love LP by Kepi Ghoulie. No matter how open-minded listeners might be, some albums are simply intent on challenging their audience’s expectations – and Kepi Ghoulie’s Ramones In Love is definitely one of those. First, while the idea of an artist presenting their own interpretations of Ramones songs is not new, the idea of presenting a series of Ramones love songs is decidedly unique. This album marks the first...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the 30th Anniversary 2LP reissue of Dirt by Alice In Chains. While there are plenty of deluxe reissue versions of classic albums on the market at the moment (including of Dirt, actually; there are multi-disc sets of the album which include enough 7” singles to contain all the songs on the album’s hype sticker, and then some), that Alice In Chains has also released a version of Dirt without any bells or...