review

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the 20th Anniversary Vinyl Me Please deluxe edition 2LP + 7” of The Score by The Fugees. Looking back on it, it’s nothing short of astounding how volitile the hip hop scene of the Mid-Nineties was. Before Eminem made dick and fart jokes as well as unveiled homophobia de rigeur, different factions of the Gangsta Rap community were battling both with each other as well as internally for seats at the head...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the “Gangsterville” single by Joe Strummer, being reissued for Record Store Day 2016! With the benefit of hindsight, the first thing listeners will notice about this single’s title track is how well it dovetails with the final days of The Clash, and where they were when the wheels finally fell off with Combat Rock in 1982...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Record Store Day-released Goodfriend LP by Matthew Sweet. Chances are, if you grew up anywhere within the reach of a rock radio station’s signal between 1989 amd 1996, you have more than a few memories for which Matthew Sweet’s music provided the soundtrack. Between 1989 and 1996, Sweet was everywhere; a string of singles including “Sick Of Myself,” “Girlfriend,” “The Ugly Truth,” “Time Capsule” and “Evangeline” got heavy...

A critical evaluation of NOFX: The Hepatitis Bathtub and Other Stories by NOFX and Jeff Alulis, published by Da Capo Press. As “Fat” Mike Burkett says himself in the final chapter of NOFX: The Hepatitis Bathtub and Other Stories, “I guess when a person tells one fucked-up story it sounds believable, but a series of fucked-up stories back to back sounds too weird to be true. Collectively, NOFX have enough fucked up stories that no one ever knows what to...

Artist: Fat White Family Album: Songs for Our Mothers Label: Fat Possum Records Isn’t it incredible how, over time, the basic structures of established musics can become re-imagined/re-engineered for no other reason than they’ve become displaced from the time and places they were first developed? The possibility of time and place being so important for something non-corporeal like music may seem like a dubious one but, in listening to Fat White Family’s new album, Songs for Our Mothers, it suddenly...

  Artist: Dandy Warhols Album: Distortland Label: Dine Alone It’s unlikely that there is any band in rock right now more underrated than the Dandy Warhols. A lot of that has historically had to do with the fact that the band has seemed to go out of its way to throw fans a series of elegant braking balls to confuse and frustrate them; since Thirteen Tales from Urban Bohemia (a.k.a. “the breakthrough”) came out in 2000, Courtney Taylor-Taylor and company...

Artist: Iggy Pop Album: Post Pop Depression Label: Rekords Rekords/Loma Vista/Universal I must confess that I could not bring myself to review Iggy Pop’s newest album immediately upon its release for personal reasons. Those reasons stemmed from David Bowie and my appreciation for both artists’ music; Bowie and Iggy have shared an unusual, symbiotic relationship for decades (at least, they have in my mind) and, at Bowie’s passing, I wasn’t sure first how Iggy would respond and, second, if I...

Artist: The Rubens Album: Hoops Label: Warner Brothers Do you know the reason why the catbird is able to immitate other bird and animal sounds, reader? It’s actually a defense mechanism: catbirds want to either blend in with their surroundings and not get noticed by potential predators, or imitate a sound which will scare potential predators away. The catbird’s abilities come to mind when one thinks about The Rubens too; on first listen, it’s easy for listeners to melt into...

Ollie Ottoman delves into the Backstage Passport 2 DVD by NOFX. I feel like I’m part of a dying generation who grew up on NOFX. Say what you choose about their music, but you cannot deny that their work ethic, approach to music and the impact they have had on punk rock has been a source of respect. That and they have made some killer records over the years. I became convinced when I put on Pump Up The Valuum...

A critical evaluation of The Best American Comics 2015 (Best American Comics) by Jonathan Lethem (Editor) and Bill Kartalopoulos (Editor). The Best American Comics series are simply imperative reading. Comics (note the editors don’t need to yank anyone’s chain like they do in the mainstream and substitute the words “graphic novel”) are undoubtedly a booming art form. More comics are being written, drawn and produced than ever, and lucky for us, Bill Kartalopoulos has the monumental task of finding the...