For those steeped in the James Blake ouevre, Bad Cameo can, at first blush sound like a typical James Blake album. Many moments stand alongside Blakeian highpoints from Assume Form. After all, Blake is no stranger to collaborations and his albums are strewn with guest spots. Listening to most of Lil Yachty's work could give the same Blake-dominated impression. However, Yachty's 2023 album, Let’s Start Here., troubles that notion, calling into question whose sound is whose. In ... read more

When I first heard Wand's previous album, Laughing Matter, I jokingly described them to a friend as "Like Radiohead if Radiohead were still good." Vertigo carries forward the momentum from LM to incorporate lusher, horn-laden arrangements. The improvisational origins of the album are perhaps evident in the fact that the melodic hooks are a bit more sparing when compared to previous work--I find myself humming fewer of these songs during my day. Nonetheless, the band manages to ... read more

My Method Actor is a modern pop album full of creative production and arrangement choices. The unpredictable percussion, in particular, stands out and accentuates the laid-back energy of Yanya's vocals. For once, I feel like the critics scaled their praise appropriately. This album does feel like a maturation of an artist coming into her own--assured work.

The songs themselves are a bit lethargic to my ears on the back half of the album, but they nonetheless hit their intended mark--not ... read more

A record that is pretty but aimless, Solos is nice accompaniment for looking out an airplane window. Dessner's string arrangements are the most interesting works here. But maybe that's just because I prefer the propulsive energy bowed or plucked instruments give to minimalist compositions. Nothing we haven't heard before (and better) from Glass, Adams, or even Blackshaw and Sufjan. Still, a pleasant enough diversion.

Indie pop continues to mine the AM-gold sound of 70s-style soft pop. Add Clairo to the mix that includes the likes of Dent May, Tennis, and Whitney--the sonic results are similar. The critics keep harping on Clairo's growth as a songwriter and how the "arc of her career" is coming into better focus--which reeks of being a line cribbed from the album's accompanying pre-press materials. However, to my ear, Charm does not represent a disjunction. The songwriting sensibilities ... read more

A kitchen-sink style record accompanied by a number of works in other forms to make it a full multimedia extravaganza. And perhaps it makes most sense in the overarching context. After playing the game for a few minutes, the music clicked--as it often feels video-gamey with its frenetic undulations--going from swirling background atmospherics to music fit for intense action sequences. (The game itself has great art-direction, but is an otherwise uninspired rhythm/platformer which bears little ... read more

There's a place for misanthropic, cynical takes on love and relationships. There've been many break-up records that thrive in such an emotional landscape. Romance is more of a psycho-drama of our moment and its evisceration of all human connection--a break-up from the perspective of someone who may never have even had a relationship beyond what they've imagined love is like in their head. However, the UK music press seem willing to once again debase themselves by bending over ... read more

Listening to this record feels like accidentally stumbling into a secret religious ceremony being held in the back alley basement of some big city speakeasy, presided over by a charismatic preacher with whom everyone is enrapt and enthralled. There are sing alongs, spoken sermons, and a church band drunk on the spirit. You may be bewildered, you may not be able to grasp what exactly is going on, but it's clear it's something otherworldly. Awe-inspiring and a little terrifying ... read more

Manning Fireworks is representative of the recent slacker country aesthetic that's emerged as indie rockers have more broadly embraced americana. Here is an easy-going album, replete with rolicking (occasionally discordant) arrangements, punctuated with interludes of pedal steel or primitavist fiddles. Lenderman has a nasal but pure vocal tone--immediately recognizable (especially for those who heard him on this year's Waxahatchee record). His songs are full of wry, cynical ... read more

Same old, same old spastic output from Of Montreal. The adventurous production always draws me in while Kevin Barnes' shtick and fixations simultaneously work to repel. "Musically interesting, lyrically annoying" about sums it up for me. As such, it's a hard one to rate--my ears are engaged by the arrangements and song structures, and then I listen to what's being said and know it's not something I want to spend a lot of time with. Too much ego and too much of a ... read more

Rakei delivers an assured, fluttering vocal performance throughout. That said, for the most part, he stays in a tight range and the songs don't demonstrate a great deal of melodic variation. Nonetheless, it works in establishing a focused, unified mood for the album. It's a mood that reflects an older school sensibility compared to many of the current R&B/neo-soul set I've heard (that said, I'm by no means an expert in the genre). Regardless, the record ends up feeling ... read more

Chinouriri's songwriting demonstrates a keen sense for anthemic pop melody and turns of phrase. Overall, the production choices are a bit too mainstream and polished for several of the tracks--especially when compared to the dynamism of the freewheeling vocal arrangement on a song like "My Everything." And that's a disservice when there is clearly the potential to be a bit more adventurous. The spoken verses of "It Is What It Is" are a playful flex that many ... read more

A serviceable if mundane indie rock record. The arrangements are predictable, the songwriting largely monontonous, and the vocals so slight (while lovely--evoking some female-fronted alt-rock bands from the mid-90s) as to leave little impression. Nothing special to recommend it for deeper listening. The only track that caught my ear was the 1:18 "The Withering," but it failed to represent an inflection point and the album went right back to the grind. The album ends on a strong note ... read more

The first thing that jumps out when listening to Here in the Pitch is the warbly, gauzy production. It gives the record an ethereal and out-of-time sound. Are these tropicallia-tinged arrangements evidence of a new crate-digging discovery from the 60s? The production is convincing enough to pass as such. Then come the easy flowing melodies and vocals drenched in so much reverb it can be hard to discern specific lyrics. Snippets of phrases and thoughts nonetheless emerge from the mist from time ... read more

Another in the current crop of female indie pop/rock. This record is competent but does nothing to stand out from the pack musically or lyrically. The songwriting too is a bit repetitive over the course of the album, resorting to same of the same tricks (anthemic chord hits as things build, repeated chorus lines, etc.). Not bad to listen to, but too trite for me to rank highly.

It's good to have Camera Obscura back making records. The emotional centerpiece of Look to the East, Look to the West comes near the end with "Sugar Almond," a song about the band's late keyboardist Carey Lander--a touching and heart-rending tribute to a lost friend. It's stripped-down arrangement of piano and voice is a welcome back-to-basics approach that underscores the song's sentiment. The rest of the album is largely dominated by muted, synth-heavy, floating ... read more

When it comes to reviewing foreign language records, all I have to go on is the sound and performance. This is not to say the lyrics are unimportant or that I couldn't read them in translation, but that's not my musical experience with the record. (These particular lyrics are reputed to address political and social issues.) Desert blues/tishoumaren has a trance-like quality, full of cyclic melodies, rhythms, and arpegiation. Funeral for Justice starts at a blistering pace and, over ... read more

Big|Brave's A Chaos of Flowers teems with sludgey celtic drones like a slowly sloshing sea of doom. Listening to it, I am transported back in time hundreds of years and can feel the immensity of the world that must have been oppressively present in the minds of all sea-going, adventuring folk. Or even just everyday folk trying to survive in an often harsh world. Though I suppose if those people heard the distortion and discordant arrangements, they would probably recoil in terror at its ... read more

Adult Jazz are one of the most innovative and exciting bands working today. So it was encouraging to see them return at long last with So Sorry So Slow. Where Earrings Off! Was a bit of a sidestep, SSSS sees them charge forward with the joyful melodic and rhythmic exploration that suffused Gist Is. The juttering syncopation and auto-tuned vocal effects perfectly capture the euphoric dysphoria of loving and living. The arrangements and performances are all a thing of beauty. The fact that music ... read more

Discordant guitar clangs and percussion unbound by rhythmic norms undergird beautiful, emotive vocal work. It's hard to really grasp much lyrically, but that doesn't seem to be the intent here--these are raw emotional soundscapes. This is music that challenges the ears and stretches the idea of what an indie rock record can be. With perseverance and patience, the listener can wrest some moments of beauty and insight from these formidable jaws. Probably will strain the limits for most ... read more