DEAR

the string quartet tribute to secondhand stupidity

people I sort of know


RICHARD BUTLER
RICHARD BUTLER
He should've called it Dick Butler. Har. Hardy har. Now, what differentiates this from Psychedelic Furs or Love Spit Love, I do not know. But it's not bad at all, it reminds me of Ian McCulloch's solo albums back in the day.

CARPATHIAN FOREST
FUCK YOU ALL!!!
Dude, yes. This is AWESOME! Unapolgetically raw & brutal death thrash. "Submit to Satan!!!". Do you know, I think I might do now. "Start Up the Incinerator (Here Comes Another Useless Fool)". "Shut Up, There's No Excuse to Live". Awesome.

CRAIG DAVID
THE STORY GOES
I hate this guy. Pre-digested R&B pop. And "Thief in the Night" isn't a KISS cover. That would've been cool, a crappy pop cover of an obscure Gene Simmons song from the 1987 album 'Crazy Nights'. But no.

THE DIVINE COMEDY
VICTORY FOR THE COMIC MUSE
On the one hand, I love everything they did on 'Father Ted'. On the other, a big bunch of smug, lame, fake big-band. The jury is still out on this batch. But I can already tell you it's no "My Lovely Horse".

FLEETING JOYS
DESPONDENT TRANSPONDER
Wow, they don't make 'em like this anymore, do they. It's so rare that any new music reminds me of My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive, Ride, Idaho. AWww. I'mma just soak this one up now. Fucking gorgeous! & "Young Girls' Fangs". Nice.

GORELORD
NORWEGIAN CHAINSAW MASSACRE - THE FINAL CUT
Piano ballads? What do you reckon? "Dying or Dreaming" starts with someone firing up a chainsaw. Then it's.... wow. Brutal death metal. Sweet syncopation & fingers crossed, no wimpy fucking clean vocals. AW yeah. That bit was almost like Meshuggah, but not quite.

HEAD AUTOMATICA
POPAGANDA
Ick. Just, ick. I can't even explain why. American guitar pop rock emo horseshit? With the now-requisite snarky song titles. Which I'm not going to spell out.

KORN
LIVE & RARE
Is this even a real album? I don't know. Y'know, Korn is one of those bands that I've always avoided because their music seemed stupid, their image seemed stupid & their fucking fans were inbred retards. I guess the music isn't horrible, but I also don't see what the big deal is.

PHOENIX
IT'S NEVER BEEN LIKE THAT
Unamazing indie rock.

Q MAGAZINE BEST OF 86-06
Artists I've never heard covering songs I've never heard. Fascinating.

RADIO 4
ENEMIES LIKE THIS
More Strokes/Interpol/Editors babies. Welcome aboard, lads.

REBEL MEETS REBEL
REBEL MEETS REBEL
Too bad I can't stand this shit, I think this guy just lives up the street. Pantera is fine but this just underlines how big of a deal the lead vocals are & how much they can change the whole vibe of what would otherwise be a normal metal album. & a decent one at that.

THE RED JUMPSUIT APPARATUS
DON'T YOU FAKE IT
These pop punk emo metal pop bands just seem to fall out of the sky fully formed. I don't get it. This shit makes me feel old, especially since I haven't heard a single thing in the whole 'movement' that I want to hear a second time. Is it me?

THE RIVERBOAT GAMBLERS
TO THE CONFUSION OF OUR ENEMIES
Damn, I really wanted to like this. The music is pretty cool, but the singing & vocal melodies are on the wrong side of pop punk.

STORM OF CAPRICORN & PARANOIA INDUCTA
JAMA (split album)
Storm of Capricorn = droney dark ambients (plural).
Paranoia Inducta = droney euro folk with dark ambients (plural) in the back. Neat.

THURSDAY
A CITY BY THE LIGHT DIVIDED
This week's Interpol/Editors offspring. For the most part. Too bad the prefab emo choruses suck so bad. The quiet parts are sweet.

TOOL
10,000 DAYS
When did Tool get so popular? Headlining this year's Download festival, along with the likes of Guns N Roses and Metallica? I had no idea. You Tool-tools are really protective aren't you. Bunch of deranged c0ck monkeys. Nah, I think it's just stoner music. & Pink Floyd isn't making albums anymore. & some people need music to take drugs to, don't they. Rush. Cool that they're bringing big words like "Vicarious" to their escapist, drug-taking fan base.

KANYE WEST
LATE ORCHESTRATION
Is this a joke? I've never heard anything else of his. Live & with an orchestra. I thought only washed-up heavy metal bands did the Live Symphony thing. Strangely, I don't hate this.

INSIDE

AS FAST AS
AN OPEN LETTER TO THE DAMNED
Open letter to Garth Brooks & The Offspring, more like. Let's leave The Damned out of it, shall we?

BEAUTIFUL SOUTH
SUPERBI
Has this band always been country? No, that can't be. Their early videos weren't nearly this dire. Is this shit popular in England? I'm really confused by this album. But, not, like, enough to look up any of this stuff. You do it for me. & I don't know what these guys are playing at, but country music is not cool in any context, ever. "Manchester" isn't country, it's a bit Smiths, innit. Is Paul Leave The Heat-on's Morrissey impression intentional? "There is Song" is back to the country. All right. Fuck this shit. "Never Lost a Chicken to a Fox" sounds like Primal Scream doing a Mel Tillis cover.

BORIS
PINK
Some things are impossible not to love. I fear Boris is one of them. Skudge rowk. Fudge Tunnel times Tad plus the Nuge. In a good way.

EVERY MOVE A PICTURE
HEART WEAPON
That's well weapon. Sounds like the guitarist from A Flock of Seagulls with Duran Duran's rhythm section, the keyboard chick in the Billy Idol video and.... some dude singing. It's not bad. I expected the worst with that horrible band name.

FLUTTR EFFECT
SWALLOWS AND SPARROWS
"Tarantula" is mostly ambient layering of female vocals... followed by cello? & vibes beneath some Tori Amos-ish emoting. "Transmission" too. "Swallows and Sparrows" sounds like a lost Enya/Lisa Gerrard jam, in a bad way. I mean, ehhhhhhh, it's not horrible.

GNARLS BARKLEY
ST ELSEWHERE
Kinda stupid, kinda funny, fun to listen to. Filling the void left by Outkast. Hip hop soul kinda thing with samples & big beats. "Crazy", obviously, if you're outside the US. I don't know if this thing was even released here. Maybe it's a delayed reaction. Couple of doomy ballads. It's fun.

LACUNA COIL
KARMACODE
10-15 years ago I would've been thrilled to know that metal, goth and synth pop would someday merge and take over the world. Too bad the reality is so fucking boring.

LAMBCHOP
THE DECLINE OF COUNTRY AND WESTERN CIVILIZATION
Good god, cool it with the snarky titles already. And I say that as a snarky fanatic. "Soaky in the Pooper" opens. Nice name for a ballad. "Two Kittens Don't Make a Puppy"... "Moody Fucker'.... "Loretta Lung".... "I Can Hardly Spell My Name". "Playboy, the Shit". "Two Kittens" starts with a long, effected, layered solo saxophone thing, followed by a little big-beat. So, Flaming Lips, yes, obviously.

PANZER AG
YOUR WORLD IS BURNING
Marilyn Manson. Big time.

SNOG VS. THE FAECAL JUGGERNAUT OF MASS CULTURE
SYNTHETIC MELODIES OF RESISTANCE
I have low expectations of post-everything dark synth pop, since the majority of today's practitioners favor stale style over substance. Not so with Snog, et al. They have gurgling synths & choons in equal measure. So, yay. "Crash Crash" fits nicely in a mixtape situation.

STAINLESS
TWO FACES
High voiced indie rocker dude. The music is bleahy indie rock too. They merge and.... nothing. Not a thing.

THE TERRIBLE TWOS
IF YOU EVER SEE AN OWL
Whoever said it was time for a Toad The Wet Sprocket revival should be forced to listen to this horseshit forever & ever & ever & ever. It sucks when dudes attempt to dabble in Bjorkish cuteness with songs about bugs, numbers, dinosaurs, math & chocolate milk. It just doesn't work. At all. In any context.

KIDBEATS

ARDITI
DESTINY OF IRON 7"
Mm, sounds like a lame Dead Can Dance sample played on a cheesy little Casio SK-5 for ten minutes.

BIRD SHOW
LIGHTNING GHOST
Straaaaaaange. Highly experimental folky songage. With the oddest sonic additions! I'm telling you. I can't describe this shit, but I like it very very much.

CELTIC FROST
MONOTHEIST
follow-up: I haven't made much progress with this beast. It's so dark that it's impossible for me to listen to very often.

DANIETO
Contemplación De La Vida Inerte
Likably tuneful & clicky blipboptronica. Now get the hell outta here!

DICTAPHONE
VERTIGO II
Y'know, I don't think the name of this project is a coincidence. This thing sounds like it was recorded through someone's ass & then processed heavily later. Which is a cool working process but a real bitch to have to listen to.

FILM SCHOOL
FILM SCHOOL
This week's entry into the moody 1980s guitar pop rock stakes. & another winner. Octavey guitar always wins with me.

FORWARD, RUSSIA!
GIVE ME A WALL
A more extroverted entry in the moody 1980s guitar pop rock category. & another winner. Fake Simon Le Bon vocals often win with me.

MANITOU
DEADLOCK
I wonder if they got their name from the Venom song in the 1980s. If so, cool. Too bad they sound more like Europe than Venom.

ORTHODOX
GRAN PODER
Hm, doom, lovely doom. Four songs clocking in at just under an hour. Sounds like quite a bit of improv happening as well. Which would explain a few things.

PATH OF RESISTANCE
CAN'T STOP THE TRUTH
The album opens with a wall of gweetar feedback. Aw, how cute. How fucking old school in this day & age. Then a hardcore metal punk polka thrash beat just like we useta do in the 1980s.

PHAROAH
THE LONGEST NIGHT
Melodic metal that is HIGHLY derivative of Iron Maiden. To the extreme! Maybe a little Judas Priest on top, just to blur the lines.

REFLEXION
OUT OF THE DARK
Big budget Euro power metal.

REKID
MADE IN MENORCA
Likeably tuneful epic bliptronica with nods to the 1980s. Which is a nice touch. "Arp"!

SNOW PATROL
EYES OPEN
Never heard 'em before, so I guess I better pay attention. Semi experimental indie pop rock. I can't tell if it rules or sucks ass at this point. Which doesn't mean a thing.

THIRD FLOOR STORY
LONELY CITY
Big budget wimpy indie rock. I think the frailty & smallness of the songs is betrayed by this obnoxiously shiny production. As a bunch of 4-track demos, this album would probably rule.

WANTS

ADEM
LOVE AND OTHER PLANETS
Wilco.

GWYN ASHTON
PROHIBITION
Pentatonic blues rock that just sounds like dumbed-down Stevie Ray Vaughan at times.

ATREYU
A DEATHGRIP ON YESTERDAY
Death metal music with Journey/Foreigner vocals.

DAEDALUS
DENIES THE DAYS DEMISE
Non-horrible electronic dancery sing songery. Samples, loops, tunes.

DISMANTLED
STANDARD ISSUE
Dark synth pop.

ERIC GADD
ERIC GADD
Soul, r&b, pop with the F word.

EVANS BLUE
THE MELODY AND THE ENERGETIC NATURE OF VOLUME
The sentence-length album title should be a clue that whiteboywhininess abounds. Encased in hard rock riffs though it may be.

GODSMACK
LIVIN' IN SIN
Radio friendly dark pop metal. Which they practically invented.

GOTAN PROJECT
LUNATICO
Smooth & jazzy grooves. Lyrics en Espanol. It's cool & I like the accordion. If that's an accordion.

HAMMER BROS
THE VITALITY
Screamy slow hardcore metal. With a Cro-mags cover at the end. So I don't think they're bullshitting ya here.

HOMEBREW
SMOKE & MIRRORS
Full on blues. Horn section, everything.

I AM ROBOT AND PROUD
THE ELECTRICITY IN YOUR HOUSE WANTS TO SING
Sweet-ass electronica that's more fun to listen to than write about!

LAS KETCHUP
UN BLODYMARY
Latin pop.

LIVE
SONGS FROM BLACK MOUNTAIN
Dude, I fucking hate this band. To me they've always symbolized everything that's wrong with alternative rock music. Bland fucking songs & the singer has the most annoying voice I've ever heard. This shit pile is no exception.

PSYCHOBITCH
ELECTROLICIOUS
Euro tech dance pop with metallic guitars & overtones. "Go Pussy Go". Next wave Lords of Acid?

SCARLET
THIS WAS ALWAYS MEANT TO FALL APART
The sentence-length album title should be a clue that whiteboywhininess abounds. Encased in progressive death metal riffs though it may be.

ERIC STECKEL BAND
HAVANA
Live blues band. The singer sounds about 15, maybe he is.

US BOMBS
WE ARE THE PROBLEM
Boppy pop punk with a wheezy old dude on the mic. Uptempo songs about weighty social topics. "Tonight" is the piano/acoustic ballad. Green Day had a piano/acoustic ballad, didn't they.

groan

Motley Crue - Rock am Ring 2005

I grabbed this video really out of morbid curiosity. I haven't been a fan since the mid 80s but after seeing the setlist for their most recent tours, I recognized quite a few song titles. Plus it was online so it's not like there was any kind of risk involved. The show? Yeesh. I think they've always been pretty rough live, but this show was really ragged. Poor Mick Mars! That's all I can say. I don't know how he's still able to play guitar. But he is. Tommy Lee's drumming is still the star attraction as far as I'm concerned. Vince Neil just sucks. Nikki Sixx is a fuckin' cheese. And in 2005 they really weren't doing any justice to their legacy.

I don't know, I've seen Billy Idol's set from the same festival & he was much better. Weird.



ANGELS AND AIRWAVES
WE DON'T NEED TO WHISPER
Crap band name. Potentially crap album title. We're not off to a great start here, Angels And Airwaves. "Valkyrie Missile" opens & they may have invented a genre here. I don't know what you'd call it though. It's like trance guitar synth pop. Cross New Order, Underworld and U2. Very not bad. The singer's whiny emo voice removes any possibility of me wanting to hear this again though. And by the last song they just sound like Linkin Park playing Cure covers. Dire.


ANOUAR BRAHEM
LE VOYAGE DE SAHAR
Movie soundtrack? If not, then, finely detailed motifs using classical and French-sounding (whatever that means) instrumentation. Accordion, that's what that means. Moods, textures, weight.


AVANT
DIRECTOR
Pop R&B stuff. Why am I listening to this? "Grown Ass Man" is a good title for a song & a great title for a ballad! Well done him.

STAR

Oh man, this new Jesu track is awesome. "Star". It takes the Justin Broadrick thang in a different, unexpected direction. This sombitch is seven mins & change of moody, uptempo, atonal jangle rock! Clean guitars & holy fuck he sings it totally clean. It's like "Slateman" back in the day. That was my first Godflesh track, I could probably tell you the exact date I heard it. I know it was in April 1991, on a train, in England. On my Walkman. & from a covermount Earache Records sampler cassette. So there. Impact! "Star" sounds like Broadrick doing Ride. Nah, the drum machine bit sounds like Killing Joke or something. Which is well within bounds. This track rules.

Jesu - "Star"

Boiyoiyoiyoing.

AROUND

We got tickets for Zappa Plays Zappa in Detroit. I think it'll wind up pre-empting my other out of town concert plans for the summer. But it should be worth it. I'm no Zappaophile (or whatever the fanz call theyselves collectively) but I'm a casual fan. I know a couple of his albums. So it'll be cool to see live.



THE RADIO DEPT
PET GRIEF
Incredibly pleasant 80s inflected light & airy synth pop. That I like quite a lot apparently. "The Worst Taste in Music" is a good song title.

HEM
NO WORD FROM TOM
Pretty, country inflected, acoustic piano, violins, acoustic guitars, acoustic everything. Very traditional American songwriting type stuff. If Cowboy Junkies did a John Denver tribute.

KATAKLYSM
IN THE ARMS OF DEVASTATION
Brutal but melodic death metal. I wouldn't put it past them to use clean vocals though. It sounds like two singers. One has a lower scream growl & the other is higher, almost black metal-ish. Interesting counterpoint there. "The Road to Devastation" is the obligatory symphonic epic that rounds out the album.

BOB SINCLAIR
WESTERN DREAM
What a misleading set of titles. I wasn't expecting house music. Well done them. "Tennessee" sounds like Rinocerose with acoustic guitars. So, it's melodic & has nice beats. We may be on to something here. Or......not.

BUSTA RHYMES
PRELUDE TO THE BIG BANG EP
I loved the first few Busta albums. When he crammed about fifty million words into every verse. Now he just sounds like a hoarse version of everyone else. & his music was a lot crazier before. I wouldn't bother trying to blast this in my car. "Blow this Head Off" is cool, vocally, but the music is weak. The one with Sizzla might be cool. The tempos are too low. Get uptempo with it. & how many times is he going to use the apocalypse imagery. I wonder.

SAVES THE DAY
SOUND THE ALARM
Dude. When music is this formulaic I really need a stamp or something. It feels like they're just repeating everything that's ever been said & so maybe so should I. Whatever. Whiny new wavey pop punk with all the fun cooked out.


VAN HUNT
ON THE JUNGLE FLOOR
Technofied r&b. Slow jamz & everything.


PERPLEX
EXPRESSION
Dull, epic trance. I mean, it's probably fine in a club or on headphones or very loud in a car on the freeway late at night in the middle of the summer with all the windows open.

FROZEN MIST
FORESHADOWED
What the hell is this crap? And there's so much of it too. Okay. Weirdly sequenced drums & keys. Lame, badly recorded male & female vocals. And it just goes on forever. Or, I mean, it would if I hadn't already turned it off. Bleh, it just sounded so crap. Sorry, guys. I really am. I'm just not into it.

JOEY DEFRANCESCO
ORGANIC VIBES
Organ-ic Vibes, geddit? Because this album is a jazzy bunch of hammond organ/vibes/drum trio trax. And flute. Cool enough.

ORSON
BRIGHT IDEA
Proto-Charlatans? Nah. In spots, maybe. This just sounds like the UK Top 40 this week. In a bad way. David Gray meets Jamiroquoi meets Travis.

MONOTHEIST

It's probably been about 19 years since I was this excited about a new Celtic Frost album. We've followed the public gestation of 'monotheist' for the last five years. So. Useless initial reactions. Listening on headphones. It's a sunny spring morning so I'll do my best to block out the pleasantness.

CELTIC FROST
MONOTHEIST

Progeny - holy fuck, it's the return of Hellhammer. Nice tempo drop there.

Ground - there's already been two demo versions kicking around, so I kinda know this one. Somewhat. This version is more brutal & straightforward. The demo has double-bass throughout. Not so here. And the guitar solo is far more ethereal. It was already pretty ghouly.

A Dying God Coming Into Human Flesh - detuned clean guitar intro & high clean vocals sounds like Justin Broadrick's Jesu or Godflesh. The vibe continues when the spare drums & distorted bass kick in. Doom.

Drowning in Ashes - Pretty female vocals, distorted synth bass, ghouly guitar scratchings. Drums. Slow. Tom sings a monotone. Sounds like a corpulent duet.

Os Abysmi Vel Daath - Dark ambient feedback swells. Into another slow brutal chugger. A hua & the patented morbid Warrior voice. Sweet. Sounds like he's saying "and piss me off". Which is fine too.

Obscured - Slow, tribal drums & more Broadrick-ish guitar feedback strains. Then distorted bass & harmonized guitar join the drums. This is probably the bit that reminds people of Bauhaus. The drums kick in quietly & give it a bit of Godflesh too. Ah, & more female harmony vocals. The chorus sounds like My Dying Bride, sort of. Which is ass-backwards, I know. That's like saying Led Zeppelin sounds like Kingdom Come. Whatever. It's a gorgeous gothic doom ballad that builds & builds in scope until there's tympani & a smothering symphony.

My Domain Of Decay - Starts off with a slow chugging riff in swing time. & keeps going with it. I hate to keep beating on the Broadrick thing, but...

Ain Elohim - This'll be the uptempo thrasher then. Mostly.

Incantation Against - gregorian chanty vox with warbly female voice on top. Beautiful.

Synoagoga Satanae - Epic. Dark moodiness builds to a slow symphonic pace. Ooh, that doom break in the middle reminds me of Cathedral.

Winter (Requiem) - Pure symphonic darkness. Great way to end the album.

PAMPARIUS

ARCTIC MONKEYS
WHO THE FUCK ARE ARCTIC MONKEYS EP
Amusing, snotty guitar pop. Tunes, swearing. I approve.



EDGEWATER
WE'RE NOT ROBOTS
Nice set-up with that album title. Because y'know obviously now I'm inclined to say that the rest of the title should've been 'but we might as well be'. So, thanks for that. What is this? Downtuned indie rock death metal. Ya get me? Remember when I used to say wake me up when death metal dudes & Cure fans discover each other? & how I used to think that would be a good thing.


D.A.D.
SCARE YOURSELF
Melodic hard rock pop.

DOG FASHION DISCO
ADULTERY
Emo metal. Did he just say the power of chrysler can help you? This stuff would rock way more without the obnoxiously over the top production. Okay, your record label spent a lot of money on this, I get it.

KIRA AND THE KINDRED SPIRITS
KIRA AND THE KINDRED SPIRITS
Is this the chick that was in Black Flag? She sounds young. Only joking. Singer songwriter type thing. You know what I'm getting at.


NARNIA
ENTER THE GATE
Enter the gate? High-pitched clean vocals over early 80s influenced keyboard pop metal. Got it? Journey crossed with, uh, Iron Maiden.

IAN GILLAN
His voice doesn't appear to have changed at all. Ever. Neat. I think this is the one where he redoes a bunch of his old stuff. "Trashed" is the only one I ever got into, thanks to the video being played on the first few runs of Dee Snider's Heavy Metal Mania on MTV back in...oh, 1804? Gillan was with Black Sabbath for about 14 seconds. Long enough to make a video for this song. Which also included the drummer from ELO if I'm not mistaken. And I'm not. Just as a sidebar, what's the point of a solo album that sounds exactly like the main band?

PAUL MOTIAN
GARDEN OF EDEN
Cool jazz lives. My Berklee teachers would be elated.

SKIN
FAKE CHEMICAL STATE
Quite basic pop rock with distorted guitars. The first song sounds like Jesus & Mary Chain. Maybe the whole thing is like that. It's pleasant enough.

THE VINES
VISION VALLEY
Damn, it sounds like these guys calmed down a bit. Maybe they finally got some pubes & slowed down. They useta be screamy guitar pop. Now they're just guitar pop.

SQUOOSH

PIA FRAUS
NATURE HEART SOFTWARE
Mm, delectable isn't a word I often use to describe music. But: delectable. Kinda like Stereolab, only just a tiny bit darker. So, dark pink instead of neon fuschia. Shiny, weavy, intricate indie guitar pop with smooooooooooooooth female vocals. When 4AD useta be good they put out stuff like this all the time. Sigh.