Review: Girl in a Coma – Adventures in Coverland

Label: Blackheart Records Released: April 13, 20 and 27, 2010 An album of covers travels over sketchy ground any way you slice it. There are more opportunities to screw it up than to succeed. If you break down the elements of a good cover, things like knowing and loving the song, being true to it while simultaneously taking ownership of… Read more »

Review: Tia Carrera – The Quintessential

Label: Small Stone Records Released: October 27, 2009 Over the course of just a few releases, Tia Carrera has proven not only to be among the best of the modern stoner psych bands, but also one that has paved its own path through the influences that permeate the genre. Their latest album (and first for stoner haven Small Stone Records),… Read more »

Review: Paul McCartney – Good Evening New York City

Label: Hear Music Released: November 17, 2009 In this decade, Paul McCartney has released as many live albums as he has studio albums. Even packaged with a DVD, Good Evening New York City, his third live release since 2002’s Back in the US, begs the question, “Why another live album?” It doesn’t take the album long to answer though. Despite… Read more »

DVD: Thin Lizzy – Are You Ready?

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Label: Eagle Rock Entertainment Released: November 10, 2009 Are You Ready? finds the great Thin Lizzy in 1981, on tour for the less-than-great Renegade album. It also features guitarist Snowy White who, by his own admission, never felt suited to Thin Lizzy’s hard rock sound and lifestyle. One would think this would add up to a disjointed and/or disenchanted performance,… Read more »

Best of 2009

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1. Pomegranates – Everybody, Come Outside! From the first few seconds, it was clear that this was the album where Pomegranates went from promising to amazing. 2. Grant Hart – Hot Wax Knowingly or not, Grant Hart went back and explored the influences that he poured into his work with Hüsker Dü. The results are astounding. 3. Rachel Taylor Brown… Read more »

Best of the 2000s

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Well, these are kinda, sorta in order. Well, after the top 20 or so, you can probably take the order with a grain of salt actually. The point, though, is that these are all albums from the last ten years that are worth hearing. 1. Death Cab for Cutie – Transatlanticism (2003) 2. The Velvet Teen – Elysium (2004) 3…. Read more »

Review: WASP – Babylon

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Label: Demolition Records Released: October 13, 2009 Are you sick of the 80s? I certainly am. Having the synthpop of my youth sold back to me as if it’s a new thing is bad enough, but the more egregious offenders are the old hair metal dinosaurs who not only want to resell their corporate sound, but also the mindless, superficial… Read more »

Review: Empire! Empire! (I Was a Lonely Estate) – What It Takes to Move Forward

Label: Count Your Lucky Stars Records Released: September 29, 2009 Empire! Empire!’s previous release, last year’s Year of the Rabbit 7″, had some interesting musical moments that were drowned in a sea of emo drama. Their latest, What It Takes to Move Forward, still has its fair share of the dramatic and sometimes it still supersedes the adventurous nature of… Read more »