Contributions
Ari Shine - Ghost Town Directory
Ari Shine Ghost Town Directory There’s nothing inherently wrong with simple music. AC/DC have made a mega-career out of playing the most mind-numbing (and amazing) hard rock imaginable for the past 40 years. Without their sublime simplicity, they’d just be another bar band. Singer/songwriter Ari Shine likes to keep things simple, too, except the […]
Endwell - Punishment
Endwell Punishment Steroids are powerful things. Without them, most New York hardcore bands probably wouldn’t sound like a group of raging pitbulls fighting over scraps of meat in the alley behind a butcher shop. But let’s be careful here: We aren’t implying that Queens, New York’s Endwell indulge in illegal drugs (and/or meat consumption). […]
Plug In Stereo - Nothing To Something
Plug In Stereo Nothing To Something Acoustic popster Trevor Dahl, aka Plug In Stereo, deserves a positive rating for his curly coif alone: This guy’s hair adds at least four inches to his stature. But his musical chops add more; he’s a bona fide songwriter in the vein of Jason Mraz and John Mayer, […]
AWOLNATION - Megalithic Symphony
AWOLNATION Megalithic Symphony There has been some talk on the internet that Aaron Bruno, aka AWOLNATION, could be this generation’s Trent Reznor. And while those are high accolades for any Pro Tools-proficient artist to be living up to, Bruno definitely has the smarmy pomp down on his debut album, Megalithic Symphony. Often he even […]
The Warriors - See How You Are
The Warriors See How You Are Fans of the Warriors' past three albums already knew this band were onto something very special, even at their inception. These California guys effortlessly blend heavy hardcore breakdowns with kinetic grooves (a la Rage Against The Machine) and have one of the best screamy vocalists going in Marshall Lichtenwaldt […]
Water & Bodies - Light Year
Water & Bodies Light Year Essentially Kaddisfly without their bass player, Water & Bodies funded their debut album through Kickstarter and came away with an alternately gleaming and underwhelming effort on Light Year. During hotspots like “1980,” with its frenetic energy and fuzzed-out, choice guitar sound, the album shines. But when it drags, it really […]
David Dondero - A Pre-Existing Condition
David Dondero A Pre-Existing Condition David Dondero (ex-Sunbrain/This Bike Is A Pipe Bomb) has tried something new with his ninth album, A Pre-Existing Condition. Not only is it his first entirely acoustic album, it also features a number of cover tunes, including his interpretations of songs by Little Feat, Charlie Pride, Neil Young, Woodie Guthrie, […]
Hawk Nelson - Crazy Love
Hawk Nelson Crazy Love Crazy Love starts off with a rollicking good time on “Tally-Ho,” a pop-punk anthem of pure bombast, akin to the premier moments of classic Blink-182. Those couple minutes of amped-up frolic don’t last, unfortunately, as Christian pop-punkers Hawk Nelson quickly digress into faux-electronics punk version 2.0 and, well, ultra G-rated Jesus […]
Roger Miret And The Disasters - Gotta Get Up Now
Roger Miret And The Disasters Gotta Get Up Now The human voice is a phenomenal thing. Whether it’s the polyp-scathing sandpaper of Jawbreaker’s Blake Schwarzenbach and Leatherface’s Frankie Stubbs, or the insane death screams of Arch Enemy’s Angela Gossow and any of the growlers who perpetuated the Florida death metal scene in the ’90s, the […]