The Charlatans Uk Wonderland MCA By: Eric Greenwood
For some odd reason The Charlatans UK have been largely ignored in this country for the better part of their decade-long career. Maybe it"s the curse of using the "UK" tag at the end of their name. No band in history has overcome that [...]

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Bjork Vespertine Elektra By: Eric Greenwood
Strap on a dead bird, and curl up next to a volcano- it"s the new Bjork album! With another set of icy cool electronics, random sputters and whirs, Bjork spills her guts at a much slower pace than usual. It"s all immaculately produced, of course, but [...]

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Modest Mouse Everywhere And His Nasty Parlour Tricks Epic By: Eric Greenwood
I suppose that if you"re a Modest Mouse completist and you don"t have a record player (and don"t like paying Japanese import prices) then this new EP is worth your time. However, if you"re just a music fan who appreciates Modest [...]

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The Strokes Is This It RCA By: Eric Greenwood
Riding the wave of hyperbole surrounding the release of this album would do The Strokes a disservice, so I will try to avoid resorting to superlatives to describe their music (although, I"m sure a few will creep in"). The Strokes are a mass of [...]

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The Dropscience Experimenting With Contrast Happy Couples Never Last By: Eric Greenwood
What a pretentious bunch of nonsense. Uninspiring rock of the "post" kind featuring members of members of"who cares (probably bad emo bands)? Overlong and predictable songs with atrocious vocals that emote over top of watered down, fourth generation Fugazi and [...]

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The Ladderback Introductions To Departure Bifocal Media By: Eric Greenwood
The Ladderback, a trio from Raleigh, North Carolina, employs tried and true ingredients in its aggro-punk attack on this- its fierce and focused second album. For a trio The Ladderback certainly creates an inordinate amount of noise- the overdubs notwithstanding. The guitars [...]

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New Order Get Ready London By: Eric Greenwood
I've been awaiting the new New Order with an equal amount of trepidation, apathy, and excitement ever since the re-grouping rumors surfaced a few years ago. Would the band lampoon itself, sounding horribly dated after an eight-year hiatus, or would it return to the tension [...]

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The White Stripes White Blood Cells Sympathy For The Record Industry By: Eric Greenwood
Believe the hype. I kept reading so many glowing and ingratiating reviews of this band that I just instinctively put up my guard. Weeks went by and I still hadn’t heard The White Stripes. I felt like a leper. [...]

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Computer Cougar Rough Notes On High Stress Gern Blandsten By: Eric Greenwood
Don't be fooled by any "featuring ex-members of" flyers for Computer Cougar, despite the fact that this New Jersey quartet does, in fact, feature former members of both Rorschach and Born Against. The band takes its cues from early British art-punk [...]

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Stereolab Sound-Dust Elektra By: Eric Greenwood
Morphing through another phase in its equally dilettantish and brilliant musical career, Stereolab returns on its ninth album with a proclivity for 1970's schmaltz, among other things. The squawking jazz bursts of its last album, Cobra And Phases Group Play Voltage In The Milky Night, have all [...]

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Wolfie Tall Dark Hill March By: Eric Greenwood
Wolfie bounces through its frivolous pop with three chords and an endless supply of second-hand hooks. Guitarist Joe Ziemba sounds like your typical early-90's indie rock nerd, gurgling the snot between his forced falsetto and a bratty affectation. Luckily, he has Amanda Lyons' virginal voice to [...]

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Melochrome Stay A Little Longer Loose Thread By: Eric Greenwood
This is not good. It's not that I hate slow music either- it's just that this music lacks any recommendable qualities, and the fact that it's predominantly slow is merely a coincidence. "Seasonlong" has a pretty opening riff. I'll give it [...]

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Cursive Burst And Bloom Saddle Creek By: Eric Greenwood
Tim Kasher obviously takes himself way too seriously, but, wait, he's deconstructing himself in the first song. The title track of this EP is a disclaimer that eliminates any mystery between musician and fan. Kasher's tongue in cheek take on the self-proclaimed "marketing [...]

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Hefner We Love The City Too Pure By: Eric Greenwood
Somehow, over the course of three albums Hefner has managed to transform its awkward, bookish charm into a grating chore on the ears. We Love The City is both a heartfelt and cynical exploration of the band's love/hate relationship with giddy London, but [...]

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Saves The Day Stay What You Are Vagrant By: Eric Greenwood
Congratulations, Saves The Day- you are going to be rich. It took five guys to create this ingratiating, starry-eyed mess. While clinging onto only the vaguest semblance of what can be construed as punk, Saves The Day serves up a batch [...]

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Pinehurst Kids Bleed It Dry Barbaric By: Eric Greenwood
Pinehurst Kids express teen angst and common sentimentality in far less obnoxious ways than peers and emo darlings, the Get Up Kids, despite the similarly poppy punk formula. Songwriter Joe Davis has a lightly strained voice when he punches it, and he writes poignant [...]

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Swell Everybody Wants To Know Beggars Banquet By: Eric Greenwood
I seriously doubt that anyone still cares, but Swell has never been a band that paid much attention to the masses. As underrated and under-appreciated as Swell has been over the past decade, I continue to be amazed every few years or so [...]

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Bonny Billy More Revery Temporary Residence By: Eric Greenwood
When a lauded songwriter puts out a collection of covers it usually indicates a bad case of writer's block, but since this EP follows hot on the heels of the long-awaited full-length, Ease Down The Road, Will Oldham proves that he's merely paying homage as [...]

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Idlewild 100 Broken Windows Capitol / Odeon / Food By: Eric Greenwood
To say that Idlewild follows through on the “expect good things” promise of its debut full-length, Hope Is Important, is a bit of an understatement. With a focused sense of how to blend melody and noise on its second album, 100 [...]

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The Lies Resigned Kill Rock Stars By: Eric Greenwood
The Lies offer a derivative and deliberate rehash of New Order's early organic/electronic dirges, circa 1981. New Order's Movement is one of my favorite albums, so I'm inclined to be excited by anything that would honor it; however, The Lies take things too far- shamelessly [...]

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