Ty Segall : Chrome

For the most part you know what to expect from a Ty Segall album. It used to be that one would arrive every year, if not even sooner than that. You could count on Tinnitus-inducing fuzz volumes, drum freakouts, and Ty doing his best to sound like someone singing while melting in lava at the […]

Dinosaur Jr : There Near

There’s something comforting about a new Dinosaur Jr album, because no matter what point you jumped on the J Mascis train the band will always sound like Dino Jr. Sure, the early stuff was messier, noisier, and more in line with the no wave sound of early 80s NYC. But starting with ’91’s Green Mind […]

Toadies : The Charmer

Toadies roared out of Texas in the mid-90s with a sound that combined post/punk, grunge, and jagged alt rock that saved Gen X ears from the likes of 3 Doors Down, Tonic, and Semisonic overtaking alt rock radio. Their debut Rubberneck was an angry collection of guitar-driven rock and punk. Their biggest hit “Possum Kingdom” […]

Weird Nightmare : Hoopla

Alex Edkins was the guitarist and vocalist for Canadian post/punk band METZ for well over a decade. When the noisy trio decided to go on hiatus a couple years back Edkins side project Weird Nightmare became his main gig. METZ was loud, abrasive, and savored the dissonance of guitar squall, fuzzy bass lines, and brash […]

The Hives : The Hives Forever Forever The Hives

There aren’t many bands left from that early 2000s post-punk/indie rock explosion that transpired in New York. The bratty, self-aware, and indifferent music scene that birthed The Strokes, Jonathan Fire*Eater, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and Interpol. In fact, none of those aforementioned bands exist in any sort of revered capacity. If they are making albums still […]

OSEES : ABOMINATION REVEALED AT LAST

It’s that time of the year when we get ready for the sonic assault that is OSEES. There are like at least 10 different iterations of the West Coast punk/garage/noise band with various spellings, but they all mean just one thing: LOUD. The OSEES leader, singer, guitarist, and general noise guru is John Dwyer. A […]

Turnstile : Never Enough

I’ve only heard a smattering of the Baltimore-based hardcore band Turnstile over the last few years. Not enough to have an opinion one way or the other. Lots of hype and lots of “critical acclaim”, or whatever that means. But having listened to their new album NEVER ENOUGH more than a few times the last […]

Viagra Boys : Viagr Aboys

First time I’d ever heard Sweden’s Viagra Boys was opening for Queens of the Stone Age. I had an idea of what a band called Viagra Boys would sound like, and my imagination did not disappoint. But what I didn’t expect was to like them as much as I did. The 6-piece Swedish post-punk band […]

Free As A Bird

I was a pre-teen and teenager in the dark days of the mid-to-late 80s. For a kid that wanted his music loud, fast, and marginally offensive the powers that be wanted to make it as hard as possible for a 14-year old to get his slab of expletive-strewn metal. When I first started buying music […]

Japandroids : Fate & Alcohol

Canada’s Japandroids were, at one time in the early 2010s, the saviors of rock n roll. While Williamsburg was the hub of all things indie – which included bands like Grizzly Bear, The National, and Dirty Projectors – Vancouver’s Japandroids(which included guitarist/vocalist Brian King and drummer/vocalist David Prowse) arrived in 2009 with Post-Nothing. That album […]