Sometimes the rock world can get noisy, and we don’t just mean in decibels or fuzz. Often the signal-to-noise ratio is more noise than signal. But no worries: We read, listen to and watch everything so we can sort it for you. Here are some of our favorite new songs and videos of April 2015.
Southern rockers All Get Out took a studio sabbatical after 2011's the Season, but are back with Movement. I'm a sucker for a strong opening track. Take “Sans” for example: insta-verse vocals are commanding, riffs heavy-handed and the fixated chorus yelpy in all the right ways. It's a tasty appetizer for their next album, already in progress with Manchester Orchestra frontman Andy Hull and Robert McDowell. They weren't kidding about this movement business. —Brian Kraus
False alarm, gramps—this isn't a Youth Of Today cover. Not even close! But I would like to mention Issues, who aren't traditionally comparable, but did come up last year via a menagerie of separate sounds. What was bizarre to some was a breath of fresh air for (many) others. So we gotta wonder, who might be next to spice things up? Toronto newcomers Aspire are in the running with Make Your Move, their new EP toting neon pop, easycore breakdowns, seamless rap bars and electronic buzz. Catchy, isn't it? —Brian Kraus
Let’s be real, at this point Brand New could release anything and we’d be happy. Just. Give. Us. Something. Anything. When I was 11 and first saw Star Wars: The Phantom Menace in theaters, I was so hyped that it took me 10 fucking years to realize it was a bad movie. Given the parallels here, I’m not gonna call this Brand New song “good” just yet, but, with that said, I can’t stop listening to it—and I want “we don't feel anything” tattooed on my body somewhere. —Matt Crane
The Harry Potter reference title is only the beginning of a long list of what things that make this spooky song from From First To Last’s comeback album Dead Trees great. New vocalist Spencer Sotelo adds an almost Daryl Palumbo-esque flair over the band’s ominous tones as he calls to mind grotesque flesh-peeling imagery. This song would fit perfectly into your spooky track collection next to the Used’s “The Bird And The Worm.” —Cassie Whitt
Organizers for the Revelation Records 25th Anniversary shows wanted Into Another to reform for the 2012 events, but there were two major problems. Bassist Tony Bono (ex-Whiplash) had passed away from an apparent heart attack a decade before. Singer Richie Birkenhead (Underdog) and drummer Drew Thomas (Bold) hadn’t been in touch with guitarist Peter Moses in years. Enter SoCal super fans Brian Balchack (Ignite) and Reid Black (ex-Innaway), whose videotaped enthusiastically skillful renditions of Into Another classics (delivered via YouTube) inspired the their heroes to push on. Moses soon resurfaced; the new bicoastal lineup had so much fun playing the Rev25 shows they decided to stay together permanently. Into Another were one of the ’90s most excitingly colorful oddities, trading in hoodies and shorts for thrift shop mod chic similarly upgrading East Coast hardcore stomp with esoteric, experimental progressive hard rock. Their new self-released five-song EP, Omens, finds Into Another mining deliciously familiar territory, with the tightly wound neo-grunge/post-hardcore of their major label effort, Seemless (1995) and the haunting escapism of their masterwork sophomore set, Ignaurus (1994). — Ryan Downey
This is gospel. Not, you know, 2013’s “This Is Gospel,” but it does have that church-choir, big-band, Motown vibe—and let me say, Hallelujah, because Panic! At The Disco are fuckin’ back, son. “Show praise with your body/Stand up, sing hallelujah,” Brendon Urie soulfully carols over all that brass. Urie has always had his finger on the pulse of what’s sonically popping at a given time (see: “Miss Jackson” to “My Songs Know”)—and “Hallelujah” continues the tradition. —Matt Crane
There's a bottled rage always simmering beneath the chords of a Protomartyr record—a kind of cloaked energy that eeks itself out in brutish enunciation and pummeling rhythms. For this track off their 7-inch split with R. Ring, the Detroit post-punkers recruited Breeders mainstay Kelley Deal for backing vocals—definitely “taking it from someone who knows.” Something about Joe Casey's vocals have always reminded me of Tim Curry's Frank-N-Furter swagger, mixed with a dash of Nick Cave edge. “Blues Festival” is delicious tension, a wink and a punch. —Lee McKinstry
The supergroup resurgence continues. It’s been less than two years since Converge/Cave In offshoot Mutoid Man debuted their first song, “Gnarcissist.” Mutoid Man were born from the Cave In Shapeshifter/Dead Already cassingle, which featured Converge/All Pigs Must Die drummer Ben Koller and a return to the aggressive metalcore the band perfected before switching it up with the appropriately titled Creative Eclipses EP, which led to the “screamo meets Radiohead” curiosity Jupiter. Koller and singer/guitarist Stephen Brodsky continued on in the cassingle comeback vein under the Mutoid Man moniker, eventually adding bassist/sound man Nick Cageao and unleashing Helium Head on Magic Bullet. “Sweet Ivy” is the first offering from the forthcoming followup Bleeder, the band’s first album since signing with Sargent House. —Ryan Downey
Leave it to Columbus, Ohio's post-modern pop princes to deliver a love song that uses slasher-film metaphors in the chorus to convey how recently married frontman Tyler Joseph feels about his wife. From the addition to a (gasp) bass guitar, to the middle section where Joseph conjures the annoyed everyman vibe Ben Folds built his career upon, this single is pretty much pop perfection. If you hate it, it's probably because you've never felt love the way Joseph has. And in that case, there's nothing dismissive or snarky this writer can say to you that you haven't already done to yourself. —Jason Pettigrew
We usually try not to include more than one song by an artist in our monthly playlists, but tøp left us no choice when they dropped this poignant video depicting the soul-sucking pressures of adulthood just before our deadline. It’s lightyears in sentiment from the aforementioned upbeat, horror-themed love narrative of “Tear In My Heart.” And, sorry ptgrw, but we’re not all in a position to hop aboard the love train right now—even one that’s strewn with entrails. This song speaks to something darker: the melancholia that sets in when a call to “wake up/You need to make money” brings you to the grim realization that life will never again have the vibrancy it did in your days fueled by play and imagination. —Cassie Whitt
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