Saturday, October 24, 2015

Music Worth Checking Out: 3rd Quarter 2015

Welcome back, kids. I'm a little late again, but between the incredible Upper Peninsula hiking trip I took at the beginning of the month (and the exhaustive write-up I did on it) and not quite being able to figure out how to be productive while living a nocturnal lifestyle yet (I work midnights, 9p-7a, four 10s for the foreseeable future), I have some pretty legitimate excuses.  But who cares about excuses? You came here for music. 

Before we get to that, it's standard disclaimer time: This blog is really not meant for public consumption, although I appreciate every random reader from across the globe. The intended audience for this, which informs the way I write and describe/compare the music, is composed of the friends I’ve accumulated in my life with whom I’ve shared mutual enjoyment of music in the past. My purpose here is to attempt to foster or rekindle that facet of those relationships. Still, thanks for reading, whoever and wherever you are. Also, it doesn't matter whether it came out in 1997 or 2015. If I found out about it recently and I like it, I'll include it here.

Breaking Tradition - Vanity




In my last blog, I highlighted an album by the band Sleep In (which I'm really digging and will likely make my top 10 for this year). I subsequently ordered the LP from their label, Hideaway Records, and when the package arrived this CD was included for free. Now, normally when I receive a free piece of music in a package, I assume it probably sucks. Sometimes I don't even bother listening. In this instance, I'm very very glad I did (for reasons other than verifying my CD changer still works for the first time in months). The closest approximations I could make to bands you may know would be Pentimento, The Beautiful Mistake (second album, without the screaming), The Felix Culpa (first album, before the prog seeped in), and some traces of early Taking Back Sunday sprinkled about. I don't really have a favorite track yet, but be advised the first one is more of slow intro and the EP really gets kicked off on the second song.

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Great Lakes USA - Stumbling Distance




Are you guys sick of waiting 6 years between No Trigger albums like I am? Do you love some raspy-voiced melodic hardcore with plenty of energy? Well then tide yourself over with some GLUSA. This one leads off in the complete opposite way compared to Breaking Tradition, as the first song leans far more toward being a hardcore track than the rest of the EP. Accordingly, you may want to start at track #2. Again, no favorites here, so just let the fucker ride. Feel free to beat me to checking out their older stuff too. Let me know how it is.

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Knuckle Puck - Copacetic


For my tastes, this young group on the quick come-up has been a slightly above average pop-punk band prior to this, but nothing they did really got me "into it". This, their debut full-length following a few EPs and 7"s, shows a more developed approach and a greater range of influences, which still mostly stay under the umbrella of bands/sounds I like (check the unmistakable ode to Jimmy Eat World's "Goodbye Sky Harbor" on the last track, "Untitled"). Catchiness and energy abound without too much cheese or color-by-numbers pop elements, and the end result is a damn good album (some of my friends would call that a gross understatement) which has me paying attention much closer than before to these whippersnappers. "True Contrite" (see the first video link) is probably my favorite track. Also, I recently found out I'm not the only one who thinks the backup singer guy sounds exactly like former Transit/Sleepsick/The Weeds guitarist Joe Lacy on Keep This To Yourself. The resemblance is uncanny.

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Choke Up - Black Coffee, Bad Habits


I once ventured into a dirty punk rock basement in Grand Rapids to see Prawn bring down the house (no seriously, they blew the fuses three times during their set), and I arrived with about 1.5 songs left in the preceding band's set. I was taken aback at how much I enjoyed that 5+ minutes and made a mental note to figure out who they were and check out their stuff. Fast forward months upon months and I've finally made good on that notion. The way these guys seamlessly integrate melodic hardcore (their double-time stuff rages), post-hardcore, more straight ahead rock, and gut-wrenching (in an energetic, driving way, not a sad, overwrought way) emo into this album is pretty remarkable. Once the opening song kicks in, you should know within the next 30 seconds if this album is for you.

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Gatherers - Quiet World



These young New Jersey chaps (formerly named "Gatherer" for their previous album...maybe someone else had that copyrighted?) play an alternately pummeling and melodic form of post-hardcore with mostly shouted/screamed vocals. The drummer constantly keeps it interesting in the same vein as, say, Crash of Rhinos, and the guitar work seems pretty intricate (and even incorporates some welcome post-rock elements in small parts). So despite the vocal styling not being my favorite, this is still a full win from front to back for me. The opener "God Deluxe" (see second video link) is an absolute ripper and will convince you immediately whether you're going to like this or not.

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Wince - Media Prayer


This one came to me via a Facebook recommendation post from Such Gold, and their bandcamp page accurately describes them as "an amalgamation of all things under the 'punk rock' umbrella". So if you like most things under said umbrella like I do, then you should find something to dig in this 3-song, 11-minute EP. 

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First Division - Overworked and Underpaid




Want to hear a couple Canadian crackers do justice to one of DJ Premier's best beats of the last 5 years? Of course you do. Click the video link below. Naturally it's the best song on the album, but the rest of it is solid to really good. "Stand Down" is quite funky thanks to Marco Polo production, and "Grind State" features Kev Brown on both the hook and beat. They really pay homage to their influences, the same artists who shaped my tastes, and otherwise generally embody what I think of when I hear the phrase "how hip-hop should be". See how many historical hip-hop references you can pick out when they pay respect to the "greatest rap duos to date" on "Like This".

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Illah Dayz - The Illahstrator




When I was a teenager forming my tastes in hip-hop there wasn't much coming out of the Detroit scene until Slum Village came along. Thinking back to that period, it's cool to know that 20 years later, I'm able to feature one quality hip-hop record after another from Detroit artists in this blog. I won't tell you that this dude breaks any new ground with the rhymes, but he has a solid style and comes off with a very enjoyable album thanks to plenty of help from his buddy, my favorite Wu-Tang fam producer of the new millenium, Bronze Nazareth. Bronze's protege Kevlaar 7 (R.I.P.) also provides some killer production. Especially good tracks include "Brother In Law" and "Obvious Destiny". As with most hip-hop records, skip the intro. Also, if you're a fan of Bronze or Killarmy, you'll probably want to give Dom Pachino's latest a listen, as it was entirely produced by Bronze, though the results are not as good as this.

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Sean Price - Songs In The Key of Price


Beware that there are two versions of this mixtape, which is the last release ever to bear the stamp of approval from Mr. Price himself due to his passing earlier this year. He will be sorely missed, though I know there will be at least 3-4 posthumous hodgepodge releases that will be thrown together in his name. Anyway, the iTunes version is something like 8 songs due to sample clearance issues apparently, but the CD version has 30 tracks. I have no idea why the disparity, but obviously the full version has many more P! highlights, such as "Orange Box Cutter" and "Figure More" (see video below). Rest in P!eace, sir.

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Finale - Odds & Ends



Here's one of my favorite Detroit artists with an album produced entirely by Mello Music Group's best producer, Oddisee. (An argument could certainly be made for Kev Brown, who makes less stuff I don't like than Oddisee, but the latter's ceiling is higher than the former's.) Accordingly, it's almost wall-to-wall enjoyable. My highlight here is "Perseverance".

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L'Orange & Kool Keith - Time? Astonishing!



If you haven't heard the two records that define Keith's solo career in my opinion, the wonderfully odd, perversely clever Dr. Octagon project Dr. Octangonecolygist and the Dr. Dooom album First Come, First Served (featuring the greatest cover art known to man), please do yourself a favor and jump on that. His group Masters of Illusion and the Black Elvis album were a distant third and fourth to those, and pretty much everything else has ranged from a mixed bag all the way down to complete and utter garbage. Thanks to Mello Music Group and Nashville-based (whaaa??) boom-bap producer L'Orange, we can now hear Keith and a bevy of his guests over straight kicks and snares again. The results are probably not quite what you'd hope, as Keith doesn't get as disturbingly/entertainingly weird as he did 20 years ago, but nonetheless it's good to hear him over production that doesn't make you want to shove a screwdriver in your ear to make it stop. It's a pretty even album throughout, so give it a spin already.

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Beyond that, here's a quick rundown of other stuff I checked out, in no particular order. Kalamazoo has been holding a quality hip-hop secret for a while in the form of the group Dezert Eez, whose newest album is pretty uneven but also has some real high points, like tracks "Gravity" and "Winter Fresh (Snow)". Timing Is Everything is another uneven hip-hop album with some real high points thanks to production from the likes of DJ Premier, 9th Wonder, and Amp despite King Magnetic being a total dirtbag drain on society (judging by his skits especially). Check "Status" (Premo), "Believe" (9th), and "Up & Down" (don't mind the stupid corny low-voice chorus...leave that to those A$AP douchebags, dude). Big Awesome, makers of my #2 favorite EP of 2013, finally put out a full length that's pretty good but sadly not spectacular called "Party On". It's got an emo/punk base but has a straight-ahead rock feel to it at times. If you liked their other stuff, definitely check it out. Pentimento put out a decent 7" teaser as a prelude to their new LP (will it make the year-end list? I haven't listened yet). Apollo Brown did a full-length album featuring a slew of great guest MCs, but his production is just SO monotonous sometimes. It's like he has some hang-up with the melodic notes having to be right on repeating 1/4 or 1/8 notes relative to the snare beat, and the tempos and drum beats are the exact same way too often. That said, it's all boom-bap, and there are definitely some good tracks like "Radio (ft. Evidence)" and "Money (ft. Masta Ace & Wordsworth)". I just wish he'd change it up like he had to for Ghostface's Twelve Reasons To Die remix, where he was given the a capellas and had to construct instrumentals around them. I think that forced him out of the box he likes to stay in and is by far my favorite project of his. And finally, Erick Sermon put out his first album in 11 years, and guess what? He still doesn't care how shitty his lyrics are, and he'll still follow any awful trend to try to be relevant to the lemmings, but his new E.S.P. album is noteworthy for featuring Redman & Method Man over the best production either has had in years on "Clutch".

Well, that's all she wrote for this time around, kids. Come back in early January for my year-end list. And as always, thanks for reading, and let me know if you like any of this stuff. Take care, brush ya hair.