Tinariwen—the Grammy-winning Tuareg band composed of founding members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Touhami Ag Alhassane and Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni, plus bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad and guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid—have announced their new album, Amatssou, out May 19th on Wedge, and a US tour, marking the first time they will play stateside since … Read more
EyelidsA Colossal Waste Of LightJealous Butcher Records [2023] As they finish out their first decade as a band, Portland, Oregon’s Eyelids have covered a lot of ground. From the half-studio, half-live hybrid of 2018’s Maybe More, 2019’s EP with John Cameron Mitchell (Turning Time Around), and 2020’s collaboration with Tim Buckley lyricist Larry Beckett (The … Read more
Shana ClevelandManzanitaHardly Art Records [2023] Manzanita is the common name for a kind of small evergreen tree endemic to California which has strong medicinal properties. It is a fitting title for the newest solo album from La Luz’s Shana Cleveland as the record displays a gorgeousness that will instantly change your state of mind in … Read more
Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs PigsLand Of SleeperRocket Recordings/Missing Piece Group Records [2023] Disciples of the riff fall to your knees and raise your hands to the heavens shouting, “we’re not worthy!” Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs is here to crush your skull with the solar mass of multiple black holes. Hailing … Read more
After meeting at a memorial for a mutual friend, Tony Molina (Ovens) and Sarah Rose Janko (Dawn Riding) started spending nights into mornings playing guitar and singing their hearts out to an audience of empty wine bottles in the East Oakland warehouse where Sarah lived. Both fans of each other’s respective musical projects, they bonded … Read more
Gramercy ArmsDeleted ScenesMagic Door Record Label [2023] Gramercy Arms is a NYC musical collective brought together around the songwriting of Dave Derby, who keeps the focus of this third album locked in on polished power/pop that’s inspired, as the band bio says, “by the artistic heyday of the 70’s and 80’s-era.” Derby sings, plays guitar … Read more
Detroit post-punk band Protomartyr have announced their new album, Formal Growth In The Desert, out June 2nd on Domino, and present its lead single/video, “Make Way.” Additionally, they have announced 2023 North American and EU tour dates (below). Composed of vocalist Joe Casey, guitarist Greg Ahee, drummer Alex Leonard, and bassist Scott Davidson, Protomartyr have … Read more
Philip SelwayStrange DanceBella Union [2023] Philip Selway, best known as the drummer in Radiohead, has released his third solo album revealing an affinity for the elegant and artful, technologically enhanced, somewhat experimental, larger than life arrangements that has long been part of his main band’s largest works. Surprisingly, Selway and producer Marta Salogni brought in … Read more
Beach Fossils have announced Bunny, their first studio album since 2017, out June 2nd on Bayonet. In conjunction with today’s announcement, they present its lead single/video, “Don’t Fade Away.” Throughout the last fifteen years, Beach Fossils have steadily earned their stature as one of the most definitive and enduring bands of the 2010s New York … Read more
Ron GalloFOREGROUND MUSICKill Rock Stars [2023] Ron Gallo has been a very well known name on the indie circuit since his solid 2017 record Heavy Meta was released. He has earned a loyal live following and shared the stage with plenty of big names like Spoon, Parquet Courts, Ty Segall, Thee Oh Sees, Wilco, and … Read more
Hayden has announced Are We Good, his first full-length studio album since 2015, due out April 5 via Arts & Crafts. The news arrives alongside lead single and video “On A Beach (feat Feist)” and its cinematic, star-studded official video, also featuring the inimitable Leslie Feist with cameos by Matt Berninger of The National and … Read more
Jack Harlon & The Dead CrowsHail To The UndergroundBlues Funeral Recordings [2023] I will fully admit that I am a very hard sell on cover albums. I have always felt that this type of record, no matter who the artist, has novelty act qualities automatically built into its creation because you can go to any … Read more
LuceroShould’ve Learned By NowLiberty & Lament/Thirty Tigers [2023] If that sturdy, fast drumbeat that opens Lucero’s new album doesn’t convince you they mean business by the time the crunchy rhythm guitars fall into place, perhaps that cowbell will do the trick. That sound, which conjures the classic rock ghost of “Mississippi Queen” by Mountain, is … Read more
That’s the sentiment that animates Water From Your Eyes on their new album, and first for Matador, Everyone’s Crushed, out May 26. On the follow-up to the Brooklyn duo’s 2021 breakthrough, Structure, Rachel Brown (they/them) and Nate Amos (he/him) find silliness and fatalism dancing in a frantic lockstep, using heart palpitating rhythms and absurdist, deadpan … Read more
Narrow HeadMoments Of ClarityRun For Cover Records [2023] Moments Of Clarity is the third long player from Houston’s Narrow Head. The record continues the heavy alternative rock and shoegaze mix the band is known for that transports you back to the 90’s while dealing with the world’s issues of today. Right from the opening track, … Read more
Rising noise pop quartet feeble little horse have announced their anticipated new album, Girl with Fish, out June 9th via Saddle Creek. The announcement comes with this video for the album’s blistering lead single “Tin Man”. “The song is about people who use sadness to control your actions because they know you will sympathize- oftentimes … Read more
Neutral Milk HotelThe Collected Works Of Neutral Milk HotelMerge Records [2023] Neutral Milk Hotel made two modest lo-fi releases in the mid to late 90’s that over time proved far more influential as the band’s cult status grew in spite of singer/songwriter Jeff Mangum’s reclusive radio silence. Loosely described as psychedelic folk and indie rock, … Read more
OkonskiMagnoliaColemine Records [2023] Magnolia, the debut album from jazz trio Okonski, uses a simple formula: piano, bass, and drums. But simplicity can be deceptive, and Magnolia manages to cover a lot of musical and emotional ground over its seven tracks. Bandleader Steve Okonski’s piano work is the primary focus conjures a range of moods and styles, but … Read more
The ChurchThe HypnogogueCommunicating Vessels [2023] The stature and reputation of Australian indie/rock band The Church is such that with only one charting Top 40 hit to their name, “Under the Milky Way” from the band’s 1988 release Starfish, in 2015 and again in 2016 they shared a co-headlining tour bill with The Psychedelic Furs, the … Read more
InhalerCuts & BruisesGeffen Records [2023] The first thing anyone is going to tell you about Irish band Inhaler is that the band’s singer and rhythm guitarist is Elijah Hewson, the son of U2’s Bono, and the minute you have that information it’s almost impossible not to hear the vocal similarities. What all the debates about … Read more
FranLeavingFire Talk Records [2023] The sophomore release from Chicago-based band, Fran, finds vocalist and principal songwriter Maria Jacobson reflecting on the underlying philosophical values and thinking that people rely on to help make sense of their experiences. Inspired by reading Alan Watts’ “Wisdom of Insecurity,” which suggests a Zen-like acceptance that “impermanence and insecurity are … Read more
RVG announces its new album, Brain Worms, out June 2nd on Fire Records, and shares the lead single/video, “Nothing Really Changes.” All throughout Brain Worms, it’s apparent that RVG is in very fine form. Named for the hyper-recognizable experience of each day bearing witness to a world of private obsessions being aired out in the … Read more
Tee Vee RepairmannWhat’s On TV?Computer Human/Total Punk Records [2023] Australia’s Ishka Edmeades is involved with a multitude of bands that includes Satanic Togas, Set-Top Box, Research Reactor Corporation, Gee Tee, Remote Control, Mainframe, and 3D & The Holograms – and the list keeps growing. Well, besides all of that work, Edmeades has now released his … Read more
GRAMMY-Award winners Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit announced today the upcoming release of their eighth album, Weathervanes, out June 9 via Southeastern Records/Thirty Tigers. Written and produced by Isbell, Weathervanes features 13 brand new tracks. Weathervanes is a collection of grown-up songs: Songs about adult love, about change, about the danger of nostalgia and … Read more
Shonen KnifeOur Best PlaceGood Caramel Records [2023] The Japanese female pop/punk trio that is Shonen Knife have been plugging along since the early 80’s, parlaying their novelty act status to a couple of major label releases in the early 90’s, including Rock Animals. Here on their 24th album, they are still plugging away, still pounding away … Read more