The latest from Little Scream’s debut, The Golden Record, which drops in all its Fort Knox glory today on Secretly Canadian.

Previously: Little Scream at Waynestock | Photos: Little Scream

[Editor's note: A version of this post originally appeared on our blogspot site in 2007. The MP3 links have been updated.]

Remember when Death Cab was great? And when indie rockers playing ironic covers was actually ironic and not ironically ironic? Man. Those were the days. This show has my favorite version of “I Was a Kaleidoscope” (not to mention Avril Lavigne’s “Complicated”). Read the rest of this entry »

Between this blog and Cokemachineglow, I’ve probably written more nice things about Rose Melberg than anyone on the Internet. I sure hope so. The Softies/Go Sailor/Tiger Trap singer’s latest project, it’s no surprise, deserves more kudos. Brave Irene is a five-piece band that finds her returning to the beloved jangle-pop sounds of yore, though the group’s tightly knotted harmonies and underlying vintage keyboards gives it a psychedelic feel absent from her previous work. Brave Irene is fuzzy but not Alf-esque, with an engineering job that squeezes its pleasures into a trim, compressed package, like a Snickers bar. With its eight songs lasting a mere 17 minutes and the high-energy band going full-tilt throughout, it’s certainly a sugar rush.

It’s a long-awaited shift for Melberg devotees — her previous discography includes two low-key singer-songwriter albums (“Mom records,” she’d call them) and three equally quiet full-lengths with the Softies (full disclosure: my favorite band). But a brief reunion tour with jangle heroes Go Sailor seems to have sparked her electric side once more. Fresh influences, too: Caitlin Gilroy and Jessica Wilkin’s keyboards hat-tip toward Felt at times, while at others the boisterous treble is more in line with Quasi. Brave Irene is pointedly a group project, not another solo set, but even amid the blur of a band, Melberg’s voice — a once-in-a-generation blend of elegance and affability, endless sorrow and revenge served cold — can’t help but shine like a beacon. I promised myself I’d make it through this review without making fun of Best Coast, so if you’ll excuse me, I will now listen to this for the third time in a row.

Brave Irene – “No Fun”: mp3

(Brave Irene is out now on Slumberland)

If the chillwave movement that ushered him into online notoriety navel-gazed upon the ’80s — Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, kindergarten, yoga cassette tapes — Toro Y Moi’s Chaz Bundick takes one step further into the wayback machine on Underneath the Pine. The beat auteur’s sophomore album dabbles in both synth-funk that would make Kool and the Gang proud (“New Beat”) and the frayed one man-harmonies and keyboard stabs of “Hello, It’s Me”-era Todd Rundgren (“Got Blinded,” “How I Know,” his most pop effort yet). He coaxes ’70s warmth out of his arrangements even as he positions them with digital finesse, a vivid triumph of modern production. Overall, it’s an album that bristles with ambition and desire, with feet firmly placed in two equally rewarding eras; as the genre’s inventor might ask, has Bundick “transcended” chillwave? Hasn’t he always?

Toro Y Moi “New Beat” by carparkrecords

Previously: Interview: Toro Y Moi

(Underneath the Pine is out now on Carpark)

In 2005, depending on what country you judge your release dates by, Maritime released We, The Vehicles. The band’s sophomore record (not counting a previous lifetime of ‘em by half the band as the Promise Ring), it combined a mature Davy Van Bohlen’s sharp cultural observations with equally cutting, pristinely recorded post-emo riffs. It’s pretty much perfect, so when the band weathered lineup changes and changed up their sound a bit for Heresy and the Hotel Choir, they almost couldn’t help but step down. But it and Human Hearts, the group’s first for Dangerbird Records, remain serviceable, largely satisfying guitar-pop efforts in a weirdly emptying genre. (Please don’t tell these guys the kids are listening to Tumblr rap.)

On songs such as “Air Arizona” and first single “Paraphernalia,” the group gives their formerly dry production a wash, opting for hesitant synth stabs and New Wave guitar sounds, respectively, while some scrambled vocals get egg on the face of “Faint of Hearts.” Elsewhere “Peopling of London” is the kind of wintry track that populated We, the Vehicles so well. The simplest stuff works best, though even at their most experimental, the group doesn’t move too far from their comfort zone. It’s a wonder Maritime doesn’t rival Death Cab for Cutie for popularity — the lyrics are less treacly, the riffs more freshly cut — and while Human Hearts may not make you fall head over heels, there’s a lot here to love.

Stream Human Hearts after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

Tennis – “Take Me Somewhere” from Ian Perlman on Vimeo.

Regardless of where you come down on the duo’s “lo-fi hipsters in love on a boat!” shtick (I think it’s insufferable), this is really pretty song. (via Yvynyl)

Previously: First Look: Tennis – Cape Dory

They say music is the universal language; if that’s true, they should put Shugo Tokumaru in charge of the dictionary. On the Japanese musician’s fourth full-length, Port Entropy, he communicates with music so emotionally vivid its meaning would be impossible to mistake. More often than not, that emotion is joy as bright as the noonday sun, his major-key melodies skipping like expertly thrown stones.

Tokumaru’s music is best compared to the clockwork orchestrations of Jonsi’s Go — a sound Shugo got to first. “Lahaha,” the new album’s best song, sets the tone with on-beat acoustic guitar chords weaved under flute notes, (I think) bright xylophone hits and shuffling percussion; “Drive-Thru” takes the pots-and-pans approach a bit more literally. Though the intricate acoustic instrumentation grows to Rube Goldberg proportions at times, on songs such as “Linne” and “Laminate,” his Paul McCartney-like tenor is allowed to shine over simple piano playing. The piano is a nice anchor for the musician: it signifies moments of melancholia amid arrangements that could easily turn too toy box childish. But Tokumaru is as keen a master of emotional tones as he is musical ones, and Port Entropy is a playground for kids of any age.

Shugo Tokumaru – “Lahaha”: mp3

(Port Entropy is out now on Polyvinyl)

Tonight, Brand X presents its second L.A. Unheard concert based on my weekly column. The bands: Puro Instinct, whose new album fulfills the promise of the early EPs and should mainline right to your dream-pop pleasure centers, and So Many Wizards, who don’t have a new record to gush over but are nevertheless tremendous. The price: Free! Seriously. Because we love you.

In other words: come to the show! And go click on Brand X! Ask nice and I might buy you a beer.

Puro Instinct – “Stilyagi”: mp3
So Many Wizards – “Nico”: mp3

More L.A. tour dates on the ongoing calendar, which you can add to Gcal, etc.