ALBUM REVIEW

The new EP from His Name Is Alive moves through the same corridors as their last LP, "Xmmer". "Firefly Dragonfly" leads off with a re-titled cover of Sufjan Stevens'"The Dress Looks Nice On You" (1) ; continues with an almost indistinguishable version of a track from "Xmmer" (2) ; features an extended reworking of a song from their 1991 masterpiece "Home Is In Your Head" (3) ; and closes out with a fourteen-minute unfinished tribute to Alice Coltrane (4) . Acuarela Records.

Full Tracklist:
1. I Can See a Lot of Light in You
2. Come Out of the Wilderness
3. There’s Something Between Us and He’s Changing My Words
4. Send Me a Dragonfly

ALBUM REVIEW

Arctic Monkeys’ Alex Turner teams up with Miles Kane (of the Rascals [not the 60s group] and The Little Flames) for the side project The Last Shadow Puppets. This is their debut LP, out on Domino Records. "The Age of the Understatement" is an epic sounding affair of 60s-style symphonic pop with huge Bowie leanings. Owen Pallett (Final Fantasy) makes a weighty contribution on this record: providing string arrangement for the 22-piece London Symphonic Orchestra who appear throughout.

Notable Tracks:
2. Standing Next To Me
3. Calm Like You
4. Separate And Ever Deadly
5. The Chamber
7. My Mistakes Were Made For You
8. Black Plant
11. Meeting Place

ALBUM REVIEW

The 14th album from R.E.M. succeeds in putting the band back on the right path. "Accelerate" holds it down rather well, drawing heavily from the voracity of "New Adventures in Hi-Fi" and the noisier moments of "Monster" and "Green". Buck-Mills-Stipe switch producers for this one, welcoming Jacknife Lee to the fold and closing out a ten-year run with Pat McCarthy; a pretty wise move if the stodgy clumsiness of the last two records are any indicator of the direction this album could’ve gone.

Notable Tracks:
1. Living Well Is The Best Revenge
3. Supernatural Superserious
6. Accelerate
8. Mr. Richards
9. Sing For The Submarine

ALBUM REVIEW

Liverpool’s Clinic haven’t changed much since the band’s inception in 1997, from the trademark surgical masks they wear in public, right down to the very makeup of their sound. Their 5th album is a further testament to this fact; melding together art-punk, soul and psychedelia with their signature instrumentation and cold-quivering vocals as we’ve come to expect, but (here, as always) with fresh twists and tweaks that dodge the brandings of self-mediocrity. "Do It!" does it bereft of any real surprises, but surprise has never really been their thing. Out on Domino Records.

Notable Tracks:
1. Memories
3. The Witch
4. Free Not Free
5. Shopping Bag
6. Corpus Christi
8. High Coin
10. Winged Wheel

ALBUM REVIEW

“Saturdays=Youth” is the title of the 4th album from French musician Anthony Gonzalez, who continues to carry the M83 banner. Having started out as a duo, this is M83’s second release since the departure of Nicolas Fromageu. Fans of previous work may have to adjust, but only slightly, as the album embarks down a musical path similar to that traversed by Lansing-Dreiden. While M83 continues its reverent courtship of the 1980s, this disc (re-)introduces us to a batch of decade hallmarks only hinted at on their first three albums. We are treated to the debut of vocalist Morgan Kibby (who often sounds a great deal like Kate Bush), lush soundscapes akin to Cocteau Twins (who producer Ken Thomas has worked with in the past), …and synth toms! Much of this exploration is done on the first half of the album, as tracks 7–11 close out the disc on more familiar ground.

Notable Tracks:
2. Kim & Jessie
3. Skin of the Night
4. Graveyard Girl
5. Couleurs
6. Up!
7. We Own the Sky
8. Highway of Endless Dreams
10. Dark Moves of Love

ALBUM REVIEW

The Breeders are a band I wrote off over a decade ago. 1993’s “Last Splash” was a breakthrough of an album, “Title TK”, the one that followed in 2002, was not. Interspersed in all of this was behind-the-scenes relationship and drug abuse drama that soured the deal (no pun intended) and became generally annoying. For them to return now rather reminds me of the plot synopsis for a made-for-TV movie about a drunk dad (parallel #1) who runs out on those who love him (parallel #2) only to return many years later (parallel #3), newly sober with something to prove to everyone (parallel #4). Whether “Mountain Battles” makes up for daddy’s extended whiskey vacation is a matter to reckon with personally; but from the standpoint of an objective listener, it is a mostly lackluster affair. Occasionally, however, Kim and Kelley Deal, along with Title TK holdovers Mando Lopez and José Medeles, manage to strike post-Pixies pay dirt (or impress otherwise) on a couple of tracks, which are noted below.

Notable Tracks:
4. We’re Gonna Rise
8. Walk It Off
12. It’s the Love
1. Overglazed

ALBUM REVIEW

The 8th album from Destroyer is pretty much everything an established fan could hope for: hyper-colorful lyrics weaving inscrutable tales of fantastical realms; instrumental riffs, non-lexical vocables (dum da da dum), and lyrical one-liners (”You always had a problem flowing down rivers!”) that plant themselves in your head for weeks; an intricate web of self reference (I’ve counted four); rife handclapping; and a fresh new batch of women (Gretchen, Susan, Tulip, Jenny, Libby, Nicole, Mother Superior) who may or may not approve of our interloping voyeurism. It’s a package deal, basically, and either you’re into it, or you’re not. “Trouble in Dreams” moves gracefully from the back to the fore—revving up the senses, then letting them idle a bit; all in some grand design that’s easy to relish, but difficult to parse. Conceived in 1996 as the solo project of Dan Bejar, Destroyer has grown to include five full-time members. Out on Merge Records.