review

A Day To Remember Bad Vibrations A Day To Remember would probably prefer to go a few years without some sort of roadblock threatening their art (or, in the case of their ongoing litigation against Victory Records, their career), but they’ve shown time and again to be one of the most resilient acts in the […]

Butch Walker Stay Gold FILE UNDER: FREEWHEELING AMERICAN ROCK ROCKS LIKE: Bruce Springsteen, Ryan Adams, the Gaslight Anthem WHAT'S DIFFERENT: Walker’s eighth full-length comes on the heels of 2015’s Afraid Of Ghosts, a heartbreaking album centered on the death of his father. The ebullient songs on Stay Gold lean more toward the bratty fun of […]

Bayside Vacancy FILE UNDER: Theatrical, Anthemic Punk Rock ROCKS LIKE: Bad Religion, Queen, Alkaline Trio WHAT’S DIFFERENT: Bayside have always given a nod to showtunes, but with Vacancy they dig in. The band have fully embraced their theatrical side (“I’ve Been Dead All Day”) and created rock music worthy of filling any arena (“Mary”) while […]

The Color Morale FILE UNDER: Post-Hardcore Self-Help Book ROCKS LIKE: The Word Alive, Slaves, Emery WHAT'S DIFFERENT: Color Morale frontman Garret Rapp almost exclusively crafts clean vocals on the Midwest escapees' fifth album. Enter guitarist Aaron Saunders, who is enjoying his increased presence by stomping around Desolate Divine with unforgiving low screams (“Clip Paper Wings,” […]

The Amity Affliction This Could Be Heartbreak ROCKS LIKE: State Champs, Haste The Day, Asking Alexandria  WHAT’S DIFFERENT: One clever trick the Amity Affliction pull is on This Could Be Heartbreak’s title track—they make the supremely depressing lyrical content of the chorus sound super-pop-punk and uplifting. It’s a great technique to offset the record’s all-consuming […]

Horseback Dead Ringers ROCKS LIKE: Locrian, Mamiffer, Earth WHAT’S DIFFERENT: The lone soul behind Horseback, Jenks Miller’s continued creative solitude has led him to incorporate broader dynamics into his slo-mo minimalism. 2007’s Impale Golden Horn may be a drone-scene fave, but Dead Ringers incorporates layers of Krautrock, acid-den psychedelia, indie rock, shoegaze and even reggae […]

Young The Giant Home Of The Strange ROCKS LIKE: Arctic Monkeys, Cold War Kids, Airborne Toxic Event WHAT’S DIFFERENT: It took three albums, but Young The Giant figured out how to dabble in genres without sacrificing their signature moves. Home Of The Strange adds back their debut’s indie charm, then catapults Sameer Gadhia’s sensational vocals to […]

Good Charlotte Youth Authority Good Charlotte’s past colors their present in a big way on Youth Authority. The sixth album from the Maryland-turned-Californian pop punks (their first since going on hiatus in 2011) is stuffed with moments that recall nearly every era of the band’s existence. The opening track “Life Changes”—complete with an arena-rock chorus […]

Blink-182 California That California even exists is something of a miracle. Just a few years ago, when Blink-182 were wrapped up in the in a very public stalemate—largely driven by founding guitarist/vocalist Tom DeLonge and his inability to commit to making the band his priority—it seemed quite possible we’d never get another album from the […]

Mark Of The Blade First and foremost: Yes, Phil Bozeman does deliver clean vocals on this record. But old school Whitechapel fans can hold off having any impending panic attacks because the revered death-metal growler only sings on one song, “Bring Me Home.” Though it’s strangely reminiscent of some kind of combination of Benjamin Burnley […]

Thrice To Be Everywhere Is To Be Nowhere If you ever had any doubt there would ever be another Thrice album, you weren’t alone. n our recent interview with the band's drummer Riley Breckenridge, he even expressed doubt that the band would return from a four-year hiatus let alone write their ninth full-length. Yet here […]

[Photo/video credit: Andrew Wendowski] Three hours north of New York City, well beyond cow farms and past the capital of Albany, is a middle-of-nowhere village called Schaghticoke. I’ll be honest, I still don’t know how to pronounce the name and neither did any of the other concertgoers who made the long pilgrimage from other far away […]

Issues Headspace You’d have thought Issues’ metalcore-rooted, R&B-influenced, pop-punk-friendly brand of genre-bending reached maximum absurdity with their last few releases. Certainly the band’s desire to bowtie the most random of sounds into tight, hook-driven tracks would have them continuing to explore those same frontiers for more rowdy, smile-inducing bangers, right? Apparently not. With their second […]

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.” However, Boxes adds unexpected flourishes to the Goos' usual […]

Andy Black The Shadow Side In his Andy Black full-length debut, Black Veil Brides frontman Andy Biersack chases his dark muse against a cinematic backdrop of impressive pop ’n’ roll on The Shadow Side. These songs don’t back away from the arena ready bombast of  ‘80s Bruce Springsteen and U2, a sound that suits the […]

Bear Hands You’ll Pay For This If this writer had a band, he would be hating the hell out of Bear Hands. Three albums in, the Brooklyn, New York, cabal show absolutely no indication of creative stasis or aspirations to become barnacles on the hull of some dull-assed trend. Theoretically, You’ll Pay For This isn’t […]

The Ready Set I Will Be Nothing Without Your Love Jordan Witizgreuter—who has been creating music under the Ready Set moniker for nearly a decade—is all grown up, and that's quite clear on I Will Be Nothing Without Your Love. Whereas 2014's The Bad & The Better was built upon radio-ready pop anthems, Witizgreuter's approach […]

Sleeping With Sirens Live And Unplugged Live albums are rarely essential additions to a band’s discography, but Sleeping With Sirens’ second acoustic (and first live) effort is nonetheless a treat for fans who enjoy the band’s softer side. The performances are teeming with an energy that shatters the stereotype that acoustic songs are in some […]

Deftones Gore Few bands are as engaging and intense as Deftones. Each of their full-length records stands alone as an individual animal, yet ideas such as passion and disruption unite their body of work. Even fewer bands skillfully walk the tightrope of melodic-and-heavy and harmonious-yet-dissonant as the Sacramento quintet have over the course of 21 […]

The Algorithm Brute Force As metal and EDM renew their periodic mating ritual (which dates back to the ’80s heyday of Ministry and continues with bands like Enter Shikari), the spawn is usually best described as “pulverizing.” But the third album from Frenchman Rémi Gallego is less brutal than bombastic, boasting an intricacy and melodicism […]