Annie Zaleski

Backwards Dancer Backwards Dancer FILE UNDER: Surging post-rock ROCKS LIKE: The Weakerthans, Brand New, Death Cab For Cutie WHAT'S DIFFERENT: The self-titled debut from Worcester, Massachusetts-based Backwards Dancer—a quartet fronted by ex-Hotelier guitarist/vocalist Zack Shaw—specializes in clawing, claustrophobic post-rock with snarling guitars, throat-searing vocals and a snarling backbone. &q

Andrew McMahon In The Wilderness Zombies On Broadway Andrew McMahon's music has always had strong ties to California, in the form of vibrant characters (the pot-selling lesbians in Jack's Mannequin's "Holiday From Real") or locales (the alluring-but-disorienting Topanga Canyon depicted in "Canyon Moon"). That hasn’ ...

Matt Pryor Memento Mori FILE UNDER: Heartfelt, stripped-down folk-rock ROCKS LIKE: David Bazan, Josh Berwanger, Aaron West And The Roaring Twenties WHAT'S DIFFERENT: Unlike Pryor's last proper solo studio album (2013's Wrist Slitter), Memento Mori eschews electric guitars and aggressive tempos. Instead, the record is full of stripped- ...

Goo Goo Dolls Boxes As always, the veteran, Buffalo-based pop-rock band is a well-oiled positivity machine that finds the silver lining in adversity: "Every breath's a moment, every moment is a chance to live again," sings frontman John Rzeznik on the soaring "Souls in the Machine." H ...

Babymetal Metal Resistance It would be easy to dismiss the Japanese screamo/metal/hard rock group Babymetal as a mere novelty act, what with their impeccable onstage choreography and trio of fierce teenage girl vocalists. But on their second album, Metal Resistance, the group prove themselves more than worthy of an honest chance: jackhammering drums, frantic tempos and drilling guitars abound ...

DIIV Is The Is Are Let it never be said that Zachary Cole Smith lacks ambition: Is The Is Are, his sophomore effort under the moniker DIIV, is a 17-song double album. Even more impressive, the sprawling release makes every second count, channeling the gloomy, needling '80s post-punk days of the Church (the title track, "Out Of Mind"), Siouxsie And The Banshees (the roiling goth gem "

Savages Adore Life Thanks to their 2013 debut Silence Yourself, Savages established themselves as the descendants of doomy post-punk acts such as Siouxsie And The Banshees and Joy Division. On their superlative second album, Adore Life, the U ...

Ash Kablammo! Irish rockers Ash have been churning out spring-loaded punk-pop since the mid-'90s. During these two decades, the trio have matured from bratty romantics with a heart of gold into marbled hard rockers, while expanding their knack for sterling chorus hooks and a tendency toward sincere expressions of love and longing. Al ...

Speedy Ortiz Foil Deer Speedy Ortiz’s first full-length, 2013’s Major Arcana, was one of the denser debuts in recent memory, one where whip-smart lyrics and gnarled guitar melodies collided in a tangled mass of ’90s indie-rock worship. Their sophomore ...

The Maine American Candy After working with Brendan Benson on 2013’s Forever Halloween, the Maine decided to tap old friend Colby Wedgeworth to produce and mix their fifth album, American Candy. The band’s chemistry with Wedgeworth (who also produced 2011’s Pioneer) is evident: American Candy is full of the classic-sounding pop-rock they do so well, from easygoing, campfire-jam shuffles (the indiv

Angels & Airwaves The Dream Walker On a certain level, listeners know what to expect from an Angels & Airwaves LP: U2-indebted guitar chime, glittering keyboards and Tom DeLonge’s yearning vocals, all delivered with the 360-degree panoramic panache of an iMax movie. However, ...

Requiem The Unexplainable Truth One of goth-punk band I Am Ghost's last tours was with the Birthday Massacre, which in hindsight was fitting: Frontman Steven Juliano's next project, Requiem—formerly known as Requiem For The Dead—aim to capture the melodic, poppy synth-goth spirit of the latter group. On The Unexplainab... Read More ...

Beach Slang Cheap Thrills On A Dead End Street EP Until the Replacements release that reunion record—or Jawbreaker decide to get back together—fans of shaggy, melodic punk have to be content with Philadelphia's Beach Slang. That's no lame ...

Brody Dalle Diploid Love For music fans of a certain age, Brody Dalle will always be best known as the sneering, mohawked frontwoman of the Distillers. On her long-awaited solo debut, echoes of that band's aggressive gravel-punk crop up on the Ramones-esque "Underworld" and the smoky pogo "Don't Mess With Me." Howev ...

Dum Dum Girls Too True Throughout the course of two albums and a slew of EPs, Dum Dum Girls have established themselves as the missing link between retro-minded garage-rockers (e.g., the Raveonettes) and darker, girl-group-oriented acts (e ...

Fall Out Boy Save Rock And Roll When Fall Out Boy went on indefinite hiatus in late 2009, they had no way of knowing how much they would be missed. After all, vocalist Patrick Stump likened touring in support of 2008’s Folie À Deux to “being the last act at the Vaudeville show: We were rotten vegetable targets in Clandestine hoodies,” saying “at no other point in my professional career was I nea

Bob Mould Silver Age For Bob Mould, three’s a lucky number. In the ’80s, he cut his teeth as frontman of the Minneapolis trio Hüsker Dü, a legendary underground trio whose melodic hardcore, punk and power-pop inspired modern acts such as Foo Fighters and No Age. In the ’90s, Mould s ...

Howard Shore & Metric Cosmopolis (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) It’s somewhat misleading just to credit Metric for the music on the soundtrack of Cosmopolis, the film adaptation of author Don DeLillo’s 2003 novel. Although the Canadian synth-pop band performed the score, composer Howard Shore—the man responsible for the evocative music of The Lord Of The Rings trilogy, among others—wro

Hot Chip In Our Heads This review originally ran in AP 288. Although U.K. dance commanders Hot Chip are dynamic in concert, their full-lengths can be curiously lethargic. In Our Heads is no exception; moments such as the sleepy R&B slow jam “Look At Where We Are” and soft-rocker “Always Been Your Love” are energy deflating. However, the band’s fifth ...

Metric Synthetica This review originally ran in AP 288. Metric’s genius is how they evolve from album to album, but never abandon their core strengths: zooming keyboards, pop hooks and frontwoman Emily Haines’ badass, angel-with-a-dark-side voice. The band’s ...