Valley Floor aka Aaron Schmidt recently released a super catchy five-song EP called Shelters. The songs on this EP burst with clean guitar rhythms that fans of Passion Pit will gravitate towards, as well as vocal melodies that contain optimism and emotion and beats that often sound mechanical but are appropriately infused with elements of dance. It’s the type of music that you want to put on to get some positive vibes in the morning. The energy in the music tends to build upon itself and creates a cycle of momentum that may help you get through your day. Throughout the EP Schmidt takes his time implementing creative production techniques that make the songs great to explore with a nice pair of headphones. Take for instance the opener “Fable Moon,” which utilizes a low pass filter that slowly lets the higher frequencies of the drums come into the spectrum of sound. The technique has been used in dance music quite often (LCD soundsystem employ this quite often) but on this particular song seems to be tailor made. When the chorus hits, it delivers its super poppy dance goodness as Schmidt sings “Not out of love in our fable moon / Give it our all so don’t speak too soon.” “Home” starts off completely different than the opener. Schmidt sings in a deep melancholy voice over a slightly distorted palm muted guitar. A consistent beat is introduced and Schmidt's vocals start to become more dynamic as the song progresses. Right before the two-minute mark the music opens up but doesn't delve into dance territory. “Supersonic” combines warm cloud-like synth pads over a dynamic beat where the flashy guitars law low in the mix. The song is a good example of synth pop while “Refugee” sounded more akin to something that Twin Shadow would make. ”Refugee” utilizes arpeggiated synths with intricate percussion to deliver one of the highlights of the album. “Thief In the Night” connects a bit more on an emotional level than the others on the EP. It has a nostalgic quality that permeates the sound and was a good way to end the album. At some points during the album I was hoping Schmidt’s vocals would be more prominent. Sometimes it seems as if they were not emphasized enough in the music. Besides this minor arguable issue Schmidt delivers concise material that may be making an appearance at my next house party.
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What does psychedelic surf rock from Detroit sound like? It sounds like the exceedingly creative At The Beach, a full-length album by the one-man band Whatever. A fun listen from beginning to end, this album is jam packed with unexpected music techniques, a vocal style that is off-key for all the right reasons, and simple yet well-written melodies that are deserving of praise. The entire album evokes the feeling of being at the beach with friends, high on LSD – even if you’ve never tried the drug, and if there’s a negative wind chill reading just outside your window. The album begins with “Charlie Don’t Surf,” a classic and familiar song premise that captures your interest, if only because it sounds so different and interesting. The first real prize awaits you in the following song, “Beach Party,” a thoroughly difficult song to describe. The time signatures change at seemingly random points throughout, and the percussive rhythm seems to purposefully lose the beat from time to time. Despite seeming scattered on paper, the song is incredibly engaging and the vocals are humorous, giving the song a pleasant edge. “Isla Vista” is the second prize, and quickly became my favorite though it’s easily the craziest song on the album. Harmony occurs in the pairing of vocals, and in the catchy melody – and that’s about it. Part of the song will likely be spent attempting to determine exactly what instrument is being used to produce the ample dissonance, while all other conventions of sound, particularly with the drums staying on track with the rhythm, have flown completely out the window. The rebellious nature of the musical elements combined gives the song an odd charm that makes the sound more enjoyable. If that sort of experimental song isn’t quite your taste, rest assured that “Rasta Life” has a more standard song structure. The sonic dissonance still makes an appearance, though it is more delicately placed here than in previous songs. The guitar solos also give this song a nice flavor. The first of two final songs, “What a Bummer” serves as a nicely crafted interlude, and is a lot calmer than most of the other songs here. The very last song, “Ghost of a Surfer Girl,” features an entrancing, layered melody. What little dissonance that is here is noticeably toned down as compared to the rest of the album, as it eases you out of the experience and back to earth. The off-key vocals and sometimes detached drumming might be a bit of a turn-off to some, but others will identify the unique charm those elements add to the album and will realize that it wouldn’t be the same without it. This is perfect for anyone looking for an ethereal, entertaining experience that will give them a bit of a reprieve from the harsh winter weather – even if the initial vacation only lasts for ten tracks.
Some things are worth the wait. It apparently took Jess McAllister a long time to complete her four-song EP Painted Faces. After you lay your ears upon the stellar production, the exceptional songwriting and attention to detail there’s little doubt that a lot of thought and devotion was put into these songs. Each song on Painted Faces has an intricate arrangement made up of orchestral strings, piano and more. The most enduring quality of these songs is the voice of Jess McAllister. During the duration of the EP the arrangements feel uniquely her own. She has an original, strong, commanding voice but not unlike some of the exceptional contemporary female artists like Joanna Newsome, Feist, PJ Harvey and Fionna Apple she has idiosyncratic qualities that draw you closer to the meaning and emotion behind the words. The album starts with “Take A Walk,” which may be the most memorable song on the EP. I haven't heard such an inventive symbiotic relationship between the strings and piano since I heard “Ys” by Joanna Newsome. It’s never stale or rests on its laurels but evolves and dissipates in a natural way. McAllister’s vocals are dynamic and passionate throughout. She occasionally harmonies to emphasize certain lines and takes great care in creating a song that hits you in the heart right out of the gate. The title track “Painted Tracks” creatively employs percussion and background vocals while “Shadows In The Night” is an upbeat, jovial song that sounds a bit like a waltz. The EP ends with the exceptional “Never Mind Buying Time.” It opens with a cascading piano melody, swelling strings and an emotionally resonant vocal melody. The most beautiful (as well as honest) part of the song is simply her voice and strings and she sings “’Cause I am good, and I am strong / And I don't have to be alone / No-one ever has to be alone / And I will walk, upon this earth / Head held high, feet in the dirt / And I will come to be just what I'm worth.” Jess McAllister has something that a lot of musicians can only wish for – raw talent. It emanates from the beginning to end on this EP and I hope to hear more of it in the future.
Indie rapper and songwriter Kaejo resides in Louisville, KY, where he mixes music to create his own brand of hip-hop. Some of his influences include the Beastie Boys, Pixies and the Four Tops. His debut album, The Unrequited, highlights the varying stages, angles and perspectives of unrequited love – everything from childhood sweethearts to club hookups. It paints the shades and hues of love with simplistic instruments, pure vocals and impressive choruses. The songs on The Unrequited tell unique and fascinating love stories. The first seven songs on the album create stronger lyrically inspired visuals than the last six songs. Those songs become slightly repetitive with their tone, beats and electronic choruses. Kaejo, however, successfully keeps the theme of unrequited love exciting throughout the entire album. The four songs that make the biggest creative impression on The Unrequited album are “RSVP,” “On Hold for the Devil,” “Sweet Thang” and “You Can’t Leave.”Through lyrics, “RSVP” creates rich visuals of lifetime unrequited love. A man loves his childhood friend all his life, and now he must watch her marry another. Tiny sound tricks, like clicking of a glass for a toast, really help cement images of this story. “On Hold for the Devil” almost acts as a counter argument to “RSVP” because it’s more about instant love (lust) than its lifetime development. This song also incites vivid images through Kaejo’s rap. The “On Hold for the Devil” chorus is the most memorable one on The Unrequited. Instantly it causes singing. “Sweet Thang” focuses on non-romantic love while presenting an ambiguous tale. It’s one of the few songs doing this on The Unrequited. The “Sweet Thang” (to me) has two possible meanings, unfulfilled dreams or temptation. The chorus of “Sweet Thang” acts as an internal voice for the song’s character. He’s either tempted to do something wrong/commit a crime, or haunted by the choices he didn’t make and needs reassurance about the ones he did. Then the line “get away” could apply to getting away on vacation, or getting away with a crime. It’s quite intricate in its stylistic singing choices and words. “You Can’t Leave” swaps genders. It gives two sides of unrequited love, the woman who wants to fight for the relationship and the man ready to give it up. It’s an impressive idea that Kaejo executes potently through his songwriting. The Unrequited has many good things about it. Kaejo experiments with varying musical genres through his chorus collaborations, which helps tell his stories. It seems like his choruses also act as internal monologues to the characters’ moral dilemmas. This adds an unexpected creativity to the album. The Unrequited complexities create a charming and concentrated hip-hop voyage.
Richmond, VA local Steve Ashby creates moods with his atmospheric soundscapes. His latest album, Lowland, shows emotive struggles with crashing and colliding sounds. The three tracks play out like a battle for sanity, happiness and hope. Without knowing the story behind Ashby’s album, listeners can quickly understand the evolution of his echoes and sketches.
The track “Drift” captures a drifting journey of emotions by manipulating the soundscapes to represent this theme. The sounds move from low to high, chaotic to smooth, and loud to soft from moment to moment. This creates a rollercoaster constantly reaching its peaks and spikes until it suddenly stops. To emulate a gritty street vibe “Lowland” uses dark tones and moody beats. This track feels combative. “Lowland” channels a battle, maybe between two people, or maybe the soul against its demons. The layered sounds help show the sentiment of too much being piled onto someone until they erupt into a sound explosion. Then they fade away. “Recover” uses more cheery beats than the other two tracks. The addition of piano sounds help to construct a sharp contrast with the electronic rhythms in the song. The idea of battling emotions is most prevalent in “Recover.” This piece feels like a battle between optimism and pessimism. These dueling sounds often co-exist on the track, but they occasionally outshine one another, like in life. Lowland pleasantly shows the depth of music. Without words or pictures, a great musical artist uses sounds to canvas their story. Lowland lets the imagination see what they eyes can’t. The Crescent Moon Dogs is a band from Bonaire, GA, who recently released a solid four-song EP called The Conference. It’s a straightforward rock/alternative EP that tips its hat to bands from the 90’s such as Alice In Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, Filter and even hints of Soundgarden. The songs don’t spew out originality but they are well written, have decent production and are pretty darn catchy. The first song on the EP “Needles & Thorns” doesn't waste much time before rocking out. In fact the song starts with the chorus as the singer Steven Bell delivers the lines “Needles & Thorns.” As the song progresses you can visualize the facial expressions on Bell as the vocal melody is dynamic and more often than not sounds like he is straining his vocals chords. What 90’s alternative anthem is complete without a guitar solo. The answer is none. No exception here as you get a couple of solos that shred before the song ends. “Golden Smile” contains a subdued, bass-driven verse that eventually succumbs to distorted, palm muted guitars and clean arpeggios. Once the chorus hits the band fleshes out the sound but doesn't go overboard. The band starts to flex its muscles a bit towards the end of the song. The complex timing and precision they display during the instrumental section was indeed impressive. “Evil Be” is a nice change of pace, which had a strong creative bass line that added a lot of substance to the song. The song has a pretty chill vibe but can’t help from getting heavy and ending with a bang. The cream of the crop is the last song entitled “Love & Progress.” Overall, the song was the most original and showed a band pushing themselves to get into new creative territory. This can be heard within the first minute of the song. They implement a number of riffs that feel like separate bursts of creative energy. Perhaps the most impressive part of the beginning of the song was the varied parts the drummer contributed which really drove the energy. The Conference is a solid EP that while it doesn't reinvent the wheel it has a couple of good tunes I can get down with. Fans of 90’s alternative rock will eat this up.
Almost There is the third studio album by Philadelphia’s Suzie Brown. The cardiologist turned singer-songwriter shines with heart-filled vocals on an album full of rootsy, laidback tracks. Brown beds down in the folk tradition on the 11-song collection, which spans from tender to bluesy to full of cheer. Almost There has been featured at Starbucks, The Gap and Anthropologie. The pleasant yet routine ballads create the perfect backdrop for a montage of lemonade stands and lazy Saturday mornings. You will want to spin this while you are dancing in the kitchen and trying not to burn the pancakes. The album starts out with an upbeat number called "Almost There". The beat is almost as infectious as the vocal melody and fills you with an exuberant kinetic energy. "Sugar Blues" is a soulful song that combines vocal harmonies, organ, guitar, and percussion to create a fantastic sounding canvas for Brown to sing over. The sound has a vintage, porchy feel. At times the lyrics are honest and detailed, like on “Almost There,” the title track. At times they feel inaccessible, like on “Fell Down,” a cryptic song about the Sandy Hook shootings. “Own Little Show” is playful and romantic but never feels corny. The upbeat tracks on Almost There are hard to top. For example, the percussion really sparkles on “Everywhere I Go” while “I’m Gonna Be a Wheel One Day” is the shortest but also one of the standout tracks on the album. Musical collaboration is the strongest aspect of this album and pushes this effort into excellence. Brown wisely introduced her honeyed, dimensional voice to the twangy Nashville sound of producer Oliver Wood of the Wood Brothers. The vocals were recorded live with the band, 11 tracks in just 7 days. The idea was to capture the electric energy of the collaboration and allow the music to retain its live texture. As Brown continues to develop her sound, I look forward to hearing her push Americana rock closer to the edge. Three guys and a pizza place, one upstairs loft studio and probably a couple bins of discarded PBR. This is the scene where Daddy Long Legs shelled out the goods that went into Goodnite Badnite. What these high school buddies captured has been blasted through small bars and corner shops all over Philly. To their credit, any city would be lucky to have this outfit parading the clubs, decidedly showcasing their extraterrestrial inspired work. With that in mind, their core sound is a good dose of back alley rock with drudge guitar, bare bones drums, and vocals the likes of Jim Morrison meets The Strokes.
“Too True, Quiet” speaks the loudest and forms a definite single worthy status. All the elements line up in this one and you can almost taste the fuzz on the production. About midpoint there is a feel change that comes off a little jarring at first, but it has some great movement once the ear relaxes into familiarity. Marcus Kitchen’s vocals have a classic sound, almost like they’re being squeezed out of an old radio. There are some intriguing tones on “Our Flames, Flaming” – gives the impression of a nocturne from space. The guitars start to really tear it up on the track “Black Hole” showing the wild side of Daddy Long Legs. Scott Haldeman’s drums become chaotic, the shouts are aplenty, and so should be the praise. By “Milky” it’s safe to say that these guys want to drive the point home. The space theme is on so buckle up and stay tethered to the ship. Or not. For this album belongs to the safe as well as the floating. Ethereal keys pan from left to right, three point harmony glides in, the guitar softly feathers before pushing into a quick 1, 2 punch with the bass drum. The ride gallops between hits and the groove is poised to break against the shores of what was once a gentle pond. “Planetary Stomp” is the lone instrumental and it seems to speak the silence of space while provoking the desire for existing conversations in the cosmos. “Ring” comes off as possibly an acoustic track, but before long the crash of cymbals grab your attention, not without taste however as the 2 & 4 stay on the rims until the chorus. And the chorus sings with lovely instrumentation, the guitar shimmying in harmonic support. The drums announce their delivery and intention with focus and appropriation. The track that got my head bobbing right away was “Give Thanks.” Those loose strings chop so sweetly, the tambourine chiming in unison, the subdued drive of drums and the rounded phrasing of vocals. “Traversing Space” - this riff is a little Incubus, nice spacey feel, but the crafted articulation down the guitar neck creates a well-balanced melody on the verge of arpeggio. This is the constant characteristic holding the song like sweet glue to the chorus, which takes the sound to the stratosphere and narrows the notes from hills and valleys to bulleted chords. Closing off the album is “Terrafying”, a catchy rocker with doubled guitar hooks, dancing hats and great choice of vocal stressing “the great god, Mars” might just be the lyric that marks Daddy Long Legs as cosmic prophets. Maybe I’m looking too deep, but either way, it makes for one hell of a final message. And just to let you down easy, this track melts into a chilled jazz vibe before everything stops. So I hit repeat. This Canadian artist is part singer/songwriter part rock star. She’s a veteran performer and recording artist who’s attracted audiences to her intimate and at times flamboyant sound. Did I mention she’s critically acclaimed? Meet Norine Braun. This woman has poured ten tons of life experience into Conventus The Eye Of The Heart, her ninth studio album, and come out the other side smiling. Emerging from a personal health battle and marrying her partner of twenty-five years, she developed the record almost as a form of music therapy, nursing herself back to health one song at a time. Her catchy roots-rock references classic greats like Patti Smith and Joni Mitchell with just a touch of Janis Joplin gone soft on country and hard on the blues. Her distinctive vocal vaults from creamy lows to searing falsetto against the backdrop of her tried-and-true session band.
"Lightning Strikes Twice" celebrates a second chance at romance over a chugging, head-nodding guitar riff; "Boy" explores the complexity of maternal love in the context of adoption; "Take The Sleek Train" is a trippy, Doors-esque ode to the healing powers of Mother Nature. For all its focus on emotional themes, the standout track has to be the barbed blues-rock number called “99%.” It sets it sights on the very contemporary political toss up of financial inequality. Over an irresistible barroom piano loop and a funky break beat, Braun asks ‘Do we pay for groceries or do we pay the rent? Scrounging in the garbage we’re the 99%’. It’s fresh, it’s relevant and it comes with a sting in its tail. “Fire Flames” plays with a gentle Afro Cuban feel on the ride and toms and to me that is a statement of musical integrity in that band of hers. Don’t just play a song how you think it goes. Find out what where the song is from and look deeper into the styles books. The guitar follows an atypical modal scale that fits Braun’s already unique vocal choices. It’s music that would accompany an acid trip as well as a late night grill out. Where else are you going to find that kind of eclecticism? While at other times the record does have the tendency to drift into romanticism, it’s always charming and always authentic. You can hear that Braun loves what she does, and passion of this sort is infectious. Most importantly, in an age of over-produced and pre-packaged pop stars, Braun is defiantly different. The music industry has a way of creating sheep and the ones who veer away from norms and hot minute success deserve their due. French high schools leave a lot of wondering – are they just like us? Typical cliques, bad cafeteria food, the aimless crowding of indoctrinated education, all masked as formal necessity? Well the answer is probably yes and From The Basement can testify that they spent more of their time enjoying themselves and less their surroundings. These three music junkies took to listening parties on the campus benches where they would get lost in music, devote to creativity, and ultimately sow the seeds to growing a band worth notable success. Our stars of this story are Jean Alvarez, Maxime Troyano and Antoine Obitz. They took to their craft, but with a patience and knack for timing that most bands lack and often implode because of. After a two-year period of limited musical interaction they got back together and hit the studio to record a collection of songs bursting to get out. From the start of the album I heard the bass and rim clicks of “Front House” imply a reggae feel. It was pure auditory association and I was soon disproved in theory when the drums never dropped the 1 and the guitar followed steady patterns instead of quick lifts with the pick. The mix intensifies and everything starts to drive upward until it ebbs away just before you wonder what’s next. “Interlude I,” as the title might suggest, showcases instrumental work and acts as a bridge between moods. Constant deep drums hold the anchor to a bottomless groove while guitars pluck and shake to balance the treble. Points for originality on the noteworthy grooving in “Chasing Calm,” Obitz uses a lot of sensibility and restraint on the drums while Alvarez plays a sly guitar melody moving almost like something Chris Isaak messed around with in the 90s. And then there are birds chirping. The grand scheme moves into a soft focused beach ballad, interesting turn in this one. Give it a second listen right away. “Interlude II” starts out with a little more avant-garde instrumentation than its predecessor. The synths blend in and out, the guitars harmonize in a wandering interval and the drums stay focused on a standard yet slightly swung rock beat. “Reward” has a light and fluttery feeling throughout until about the 2:30 minute mark. Things drop in tone and register to deliver some chunky grease rock. Still the flighty guitar lick comes in and the ear is spread with contrasting sound - a theme throughout Battles & Shields. I find this group to be on to something. Something that will take shape with a little more fine tuning and public exposure. As an international group they have some serious relevancy here in the states and that says a lot. The French music scene is blossoming great artists and I personally can attest to having invested my time to listening and buying various French material. I’m excited for what’s to come in From The Basement’s future. As of right now, keep an eye out. They’ll be busy. They’ll be back.
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May 2024
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