The Hold Steady Boys And Girls In America Vagrant By: Eric Greenwood
Lyrics can often make or break a band. Even an otherwise rocking song can be destroyed by a few clumsy clichés. And since most bands have jumped right into emo's pandering, self-pitying cesspool of over-used lamentations, it's refreshing to listen to a band [...]

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Lily Allen Alright, Still Regal By: Eric Greenwood
I was a fan of Lily Allen's long before I even heard a note of her music. Her reputation for trashing her peers and calling bullshit on the hypocrisy of the rock star lifestyle preceded her. On Pete Doherty: "I do think he needs to be exterminated." [...]

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The Slits Return Of The Giant Slits!: History And Conversation Saf By: Eric Greenwood
As much as I hate the idea of reunions, I must admit I can't resist certain regroupings. It's just as easily a case of morbid curiosity as it is genuine excitement that forces me to go see bands decades past their [...]

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The Mars Volta Amputechture GSL/Universal By: Eric Greenwood
Despite its post-punk pedigree, it's hard to imagine The Mars Volta sharing many fans with today's typical indie kid. You know the type cuddled up with his Sufjan Stevens records, wearing a nondescript striped sweater, faux frames, and spotty facial hair. That kid hates The Mars Volta [...]

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The Lemonheads The Lemonheads Vagrant By: Eric Greenwood
Mastering slacker ennui just before Pavement made it trendy, Evan Dando forged a career out of backhanded compliments and unabashed, dopey sincerity. While the name The Lemonheads denotes a band, it's been Dando's show from the beginning. With a revolving cast of part-time members, Dando swindled his [...]

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Appomattox Appomattox Self-released By: Eric Greenwood
Boston's Appomattox has been slowly cultivating its unique brand of noisy indie rock since splintering away from guitarist Cliff Rawson and its lavish and dynamic former incarnation, Araby, just over two years ago. With a pummeling schedule of Northeastern shows, the band has taken its time producing its [...]

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The Rapture Pieces Of The People We Love Universal Motown By: Eric Greenwood
I liked The Rapture a whole lot better back when it blatantly ripped off The Cure and Bauhaus and Gang of Four as opposed to cheesy, cheesy dance music. The Rapture fell off my radar the moment Echoes finally came out. [...]

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Cursive Happy Hollow Saddle Creek By: Eric Greenwood
The Ugly Organ is my favorite Cursive album, hands down, and it was Kasher's post-post break-up album. It was the culmination of all the promiscuity, drunken nights, and wrong words said turned into a corrosive morass of regret, jealousy, anger, and frustration. It played into [...]

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Journey Greatest Hits Columbia By: Michael Jones
While the remaining members of Journey besmirch their legacy touring with, of all things, a former Gap employee filling in for Steve Perry, Columbia Records is re-mastering and re-releasing Journey's entire back catalog, beginning with Greatest Hits, and the timing couldn't be better: a new audience, too young [...]

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Alaska The Tiger Now We're Familiar Naked Kids Doing Karate By: Eric Greenwood
Yes, Alaska the Tiger's name follows the same convention as Pedro the Lion's, but any similarities to the Jade Tree sound end right there. This Columbia, South Carolina trio owes little to nothing to the modern day emo movement, harkening back [...]

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Junior Boys So This Is Goodbye Domino By: Eric Greenwood
In today's gimmicky, instant gratification and overly niche music market, bands that present themselves in vagueness and anti-image often seem married to a sense of bittersweet nostalgia that doesn't have much bite in 2006. However, mystery still has an inexplicable allure, especially when it's cloaked [...]

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Phoenix It's Never Been Like That Astralwerks By: Eric Greenwood
Pop music rarely gets any proper respect, what with all the schlock that permeates commercial radio, but it's pop's melodic accessibility that inherently marks it as music for the masses, which, of course, is typically frowned upon by any discerning arbiter of taste. Thus, [...]

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Danielson Ships Secretly Canadian By: Eric Greenwood
With a shrill, pixie-stick blurt to his uneven and deliberately jagged cadence, Daniel Smith resembles the Pixies' Black Francis on crack- two octaves higher and even more erratic. It's an undeniably acquired vocal style, which, coupled with his penchant for wildly eccentric instrumentation and wide-eyed innocence, can make [...]

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The Knife Silent Shout Mute By: Kerry M
On this, the third record from Sweden's sibling duo The Knife, we find Olof Dreijer and Karin Dreijer Andersson delivering another dose of their signature synthladen eurotrash pop cacophony. Karin's processed vocals often channel a sort of strung-out and carbonite encrusted Kate Bush while icy, Spector-like walls [...]

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The Jesus And Mary Chain Psychocandy; Darklands; Automatic; Honey's Dead; Stoned Rhino By: Eric Greenwood
If you only know three chords, play them loudly. The Jesus and Mary Chain took this axiom and turned it on its head. With a cache of predictable influences, Scottish brothers Jim and William Reid turned underground music into a [...]

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Sonic Youth Rather Ripped Geffen By: Eric Greenwood
As strange as it may seem, the first few notes of "Reena", the opening track of Sonic Youth's 14th album, Rather Ripped, sound like Belle & Sebastian. Has Sonic Youth gone twee? Well, no, not really, but it has put out its most concise, stripped down, [...]

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Regina Spektor Begin To Hope Sire By: Eric Greenwood
Regina Spektor isn't just another in an endless line of quirky female singer-songwriters with classical training; she adds Russian Jew from New York City to the formula, which may or may not scare you away. Her penchant for hyperbolic melancholy and fairy tale whimsy easily invites [...]

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Thom Yorke The Eraser XL By: Eric Greenwood
It's easy to assume that Thom Yorke pulls most of the strings in Radiohead. He's the singer, ergo, the focal point, and he plays guitar. It's a fair assumption. But one listen to The Eraser, and it's clear that his influence extends only so [...]

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Murder By Death In Bocca Al Lupo Tent Show By: Eric Greenwood
On its second album, Who Will Survive and What Will Be Left of Them? (a title knicked from a Texas Chainsaw Massacre promotional movie poster), Bloomington, Indiana's Murder By Death weaved a thematic story of the devil's infiltration of a small Mexican town [...]

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Anakrid Father Stereonucleosis By: Eric Greenwood
Since the unexpected demise of Newgenics (a heavily-hyped, short-lived amalgamation of notable local musicians that put out one seven-inch on Level Plane Records), Columbia, South Carolina's Chris Bickel has kept a low profile. Well, low for Chris Bickel. Bickel still has a weekly karaoke stint, Mr. B's Goodtime Karaoke [...]

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