Blog.WBRU

When I first heard that All American Rejects was putting out a new album, I cringed.  Sure, “My Paper Heart” and “Swing, Swing” were two catchy, though unforgivably pop-y singles off their eponymous debut album, and “Dirty Little Secret” had a pretty awesome music video.  But I thought that that band had disappeared into the ranks of TRL has-beens.  Well, it hasn’t.

AAR’s newest album When the World Comes Down definitely doesn’t betray the band’s pop-tastic roots, but it is so much more sophisticated than their first two that I thought I’d been given the wrong cd.  They’ve given up the falsetto (for the most part) and turned to legit vocals (lyrics questionable) and catchy piano and guitar.  Some of the songs remind me a little bit of 90s wonderband Third Eye Blind.  While the lyrics still tend to appeal only to the recently dumped (”Damn girl, dry your eyes \ you stole my heart and then you kicked me aside”), the album as a whole surely trumps anything the band has done to date. Read the rest » »

Tell all your enemies and friends, the kings of pop punk just went and did it again. The thing that drew me to the boys’ last outing, Infinity on High, was how the band took their well established pop pedigrees up a notch with outlandish song composition. I’m talking horns sections and Jay Z cameos. Folie ups the ante even further. A high energy rock song that closes with a trumpet burst and violin concerto? Easy. ZZ Top riffs reimagined into a pop hit critiquing celebrity culture? Why not. A power ballad featuring Elvis Costello that breaks down into a choir of Warped Tour all stars singing past FOB hits “We Are The World”-style? You bet your ass.

With this hyper-frenetic barrage of chord progressions, production pieces, and namedrop cameos, you would think that the Fall Out Boys would have trouble keeping it coherent. You would be wrong. The album flows adeptly from highs and lows. The high energy music is meant to give you rock out anthems to scream at the top of your lungs while the slowed down production spots and ballads are meant to keep it sounding dynamic. Pat going folk song A Capella in “w.a.m.s.” or the band going piano pop for “20 Dollar Nose Bleed” are not there to stop your good time. They are well placed chances for you to catch your breath and appreciate their musicianship before they give you something to jump around to again.

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Bloc Party is a difficult band to categorize. With styles that range from the harsh but highly danceable post-punk realities of their 2005 debut Silent Alarm to the gloomily aggressive ballads of A Weekend In The City, they manage to simultaneously hook new fans and frustrate old ones like no other. Although the band’s potential is audible on both albums, they keep stumbling restively through various genres in search of a fitting niche, never quite honest with themselves.  What great news it was, then, when it was announced earlier this year that Bloc Party’s upcoming third release was to be named Intimacy? Could it be that Kele Okereke and his troupe finally found themselves and were ready to present to us their very own, carefully matured brand of alt-rock?

Although not quite what was expected, Intimacy starts off with a bang: ‘Setting Sun’ by The Chemical Brothers mashed up with guitar unusually ragged guitar riffs on the track ‘Ares’ . Russel Lissack’s Telecaster, in fact, sounds more like an industrial size grinder than a musical instrument and Matt Tong’s drum work is reminiscent of a slack joint jackhammer. Even Kele Okereke’s vocals present themselves as just another industrial tool used in the assembly of this song. Paradoxically, the result sounds highly individual and Okereke’s alienating vocals tell a better and more credible story than any of the lachrymose poetry from A Weekend In The City. Read the rest » »

Ever since Brandon Flowers announced that the follow-up to Sam’s Town would be a departure from their failed attempt to produce stadium rock, the Killers’ third LP has been hyped into the next decade and back.  If you’ve been keeping your album release calendar up to date or were just curious as to when the boys from Las Vegas would put out something more like “Somebody Told Me” and less like “When You Were Young”, you are probably wondering, as I was, if Day & Age is really all it’s cracked up to be.

It is.  It definitely, undoubtedly is.  Gone are the days of Flowers’ facial hair and Bruce Springsteen imitations. Day & Age is more like David Bowie, blending an 80s pop sound with characteristics that are distinctively Killers. Read the rest » »

About a year ago I was walking to the station to see this band I had never really listened to play in the studio. As I was walking up, I got a text from my friend (and WBRU DJ) Chase, “Chris is freaking out!” Traditionally when bands come into the studio to play, they bring with them an acoustic guitar or two and we mic up and roll tape (there are of course some exceptions). Manchester Orchestra had brought with them a touring trailer full of gear they wanted to use. Chris, our former programming director and all-around recording guru, was trying to figure out how to jam all their instruments/band members in our cramped FM studio. I did my best to lug random guitars amps and drum heads to the studio while letting the grown ups figure out which wires went where. The band eventually decided that they were going to have to work out a new arrangement to accommodate the space. I was convinced that the clusterfuck that was this afternoon was going to make for some pretty crappy music. Read the rest » »

The most efficient way to describe this album is that it’s not what it sounds like. As one of the many people on this planet who can’t appreciate death metal and who always started crying as a child upon hearing Don Henley’s voice (maybe that last one was just me), I was certainly grateful for this. But apart from the clue in the band name that ended up being a red herring, I had no other ideas as to what this music would be like, and was surprised when the album’s sound spanned from blues to hard rock.

Heart On starts off strong with the combination of a tambourine and a spunky, bluesy guitar riff in “Anything ‘cept The Truth”. It’s about as powerful as the album gets, sound-wise, and the listener immediately gets a sense of the confident tone of the lyrics: “I’ll tell you anything, baby, ‘cept the truth”. The whole album has a sort of playful, raunchy approach to love that is more immediately evident in the music style than the lyrics, but certain songs like “Solo Flights” and “I’m Your Torpedo” are more outwardly suggestive. The album makes a dramatic switch in its second song, which is the highlight of the album. “Wannabe in L.A.” is so catchy that you wonder how Jesse Hughes was able to ditch his bad-boy image for long enough to pull it off. This song gives the band a second side; in addition to being disciples of old-fashioned, sex-infused rock & roll, they’re also two manly men who aren’t too proud to dance every once in a while. The rest of the album fluctuates between these two extremes – nothing epic, but all completely solid. At the risk of saying that this album’s merits are exclusively guitar-related, Josh Homme’s drumming is consistently clean and featured often, as in “Secret Plans”. I personally preferred the more immediately danceable tracks like “Heart On” to the heavier ones, because I felt that the variety these songs contributed to the album made Heart On what it is, and not just because one of them had the same name. However, I know that in time I’ll be in love with each and every one of these songs. Read the rest » »

What are you expecting of a new album from the Kaiser Chiefs? Strong choruses, energetic and feverish party-openers (see “I Predict a Riot”), catchy and irreproachable alt-rock tunes, a few ballads at the end? Well, you can’t change a winning team.

Without a doubt, the 5 English university roommates will please the young and restless indie fans out there with their new installment. Right from the beginning, the dark riffs from “Spanish Metal” open the way for a fast-paced, new-wave ride, like that exciting climb on the roller coaster before the great drop of “Never Miss A Beat.” Full of those short unforgettable lines (“What did you learn today? -I learned nothing”) and choruses, you’re bound to be on your feet before the end of the song, jumping with “those kids on the street, no they never miss a beat.” To know if you’ve turned the song on loud enough to do that, you should be able to catch Lily Allen’s voice in the background, reminding you that the Chiefs really aren’t that indie overseas band, but a rock force to be reckoned with. Read the rest » »

What would happen if you sent Queen, the Shins, and Beck to Georgia, locked them in a studio for six months and told them to put together fifteen tracks? Well, you’d either finally know the meaning of life, or you would have an album very similar to Of Montreal’s Skeletal Lamping. The guys (and girl) from Athens, Georgia have come full circle and then some in their latest album, returning to their more experimental roots without betraying their recent indie-pop success. Frontman Kevin Barnes sometimes croons, sometimes whines, sometimes warbles his way through a somewhat disconnected composition, creating an album that, at first listen, I just didn’t understand.

But wait, don’t run out and return your still-shrinkwrapped CD. I said at first listen I didn’t understand it. Ok, so I still don’t understand it, but I can appreciate it. Track by track, it is intriguing and surely non-boring. On the whole, though, its kind of tiring – not the kind of music you could mow the lawn to. The first track, “Nonpareil of Flavor,” taunts you with a bit of Freddie Mercury-esque rock opera but then quickly fades to a slower, more harmonic melody and again to a two-minute sci-fi jam. In the final seconds the vocals come back, this time airy and fleeting, melting over the persistent chords. “Wicked Wisdom” follows the same course, but with a few electronic thumps scattered throughout.

“For Our Elegant Caste” is the first genuinely catchy song on the album, though the “la las” at the end seem a bit childish. The album takes a decidedly depressing turn with “Touched Something’s Hollow,” a dark tale of self-doubt and sorrow (“I don’t know how long I can hold on, if it’s gonna be like this forever…”). That ends quickly and Barnes picks the whimsy back up with “An Eluardian Instance.” It’s an upbeat, group melody encouragingly employs trumpets and brings to mind images of balloons floating against a cloudless sky (or maybe I just listened to too much Polyphonic Spree earlier in the decade). Read the rest » »