CDs + Vinyl:

Abhorrent Decimation – The Pardoner CD (Prosthetic)
Abhorrent Decimation offer up their most inspired, charismatic and dominating material to date in the form of sophomore album The Pardoner. [Vinyl edition due August 25.]

Afterbirth – Time Traveler’s Dilemma CD/LP (Unique Leader)
New York-based death metal behemoths Afterbirth – featuring within its ranks members of Helmet, Artificial Brain, and Buckshot Facelift – release their brutalizing debut full-length.

Aminé – Good For You CD (Republic)
Debut album from the critically-acclaimed Portland, Oregon rapper.

Arthur Alexander – Arthur Alexander [Reissue/1972] CD (Omnivore)
When The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Humble Pie, Dusty Springfield, George Jones & Johnny Paycheck, Bob Dylan, the Bee Gees and countless others cover your songs, you must be on to something. Arthur Alexander was a songwriter and song stylist, whose career took off in the early 1960s—writing and recording hits like “Anna (Go To Him)” and “You Better Move On”—some of the earliest hits recorded at Rick Hall’s Fame Studios and featuring the famed Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. After a short break at the end of the decade, he released a self-titled ‘comeback’ album in 1972. This reissue of that album is expanded with six bonus tracks—two previously unissued. Arthur Alexander was produced by Muscle Shoals bassist Tommy Gogbill, and include a version of “Burning Love”—covered by Elvis Presley shortly after the album’s release. As Barry Hansen (better known to most as Dr. Demento) wrote in the original notes, “Arthur is especially proud of the variety and versatility of his work on this album. All of it is strong medicine, and should be a fine antidote for a lot of bad scenes.”

Herb Alpert – Music Volume 1 CD (Herb Alpert)
Joyful, romantic sounds that stir the soul: that’s the overarching theme of the trumpeter and composers’ new album, Music Volume 1. Alpert’s passion for timeless melodies takes the listener on a voyage that spans genres and generations with surprising twists and turns. Music Volume 1 arrives with a brand-new song written by Alpert, the infectiously funky “Sugarfoot.” The euphoric album unfurls with tasteful twists on iconic songs, such as turntable scratches and electronic flourishes on “Unforgettable” and “Cheek To Cheek.” The inclusion of both “Michelle” and “Imagine” point to the near-endless inspiration that Alpert draws from the music of John Lennon and The Beatles. In his hands, “Michelle” starts with lush strings and effortlessly shifts into a swinging, Parisian-inspired jazz motif. Alpert’s lifelong love of Django Reinhardt led him to the classic “C’est Si Bon” and further takes the listener on a trip straight to France, the smell of tulips in the air, lovers walking hand in hand. Herb also puts a fresh, breezy spin on “Flamingo,” a song he first recorded for 1966’s chart-topper S.R.O.

Aphex Twin – Selected Ambient Works Volume II [Reissue/1994] 2xCD (Warp)
Aphex Twin – I Care Because You Do [Reissue/1995] CD/2xLP+MP3 (Warp)
Aphex Twin – Richard D. James Album [Reissue/1996] CD/LP+MP3 (Warp)
Aphex Twin – Come To Daddy [Reissue/1997] CDEP/12”+MP3 (Warp)
Aphex Twin – Windowlicker [Reissue/1999] CDEP/12”+MP3 (Warp)
Classic Aphex Twin back in print on CD and vinyl formats.

Arcade Fire – Everything Now CD/LP/Cassette (Columbia)
“Filing a review of Arcade Fire’s new album, one that will be aggregated with myriad others, is really antithetical to the whole point of it, i.e. that we’re so overwhelmed with thoughts, feelings, opinions – ‘content’ – in 2017, that the meaning of words is diminishing at a rate of terabytes-per-second. This palpable modern information overload has been niggling at the band for years, but Everything Now is their fullest expression of it yet. The torrent of content we absorb on a daily basis is a topic ripe for art that has been largely been under-explored in music thus far, but Arcade Fire don’t do it in somber and morbid fashion, Everything Now being their most upbeat, joyful album to date. It’s like they’ve chopped up a bunch of Abba tracks with this album, tenderized them, sprinkled them with glitter and reassembled them into something a little more subtle and insouciant. Arcade Fire’s fifth studio album doesn’t have the sprawling nature of The Suburbs or Reflektor nor the cacophonic intensity of Funeral, but the sequin-festooned, disco-ish Everything Now is every bit as good as these albums in its own right. Departures in sound are often unwelcome when we’re already so happy with where a beloved band are, but, in this case, their experiments are a complete success.” – The Independent. [Two covers are available: ‘Day Version’ and an exclusive indie-store-only ‘Night Version.’ Limited blue colored vinyl pressing also available.]

Bênní – I & II CD/LP (Goner)
Hailing from an H Class planet far across the cosmic highways, Bênní makes hi-NRG new age music.

Peter Bernstein – Signs Live CD (Smoke Session)
Jazz guitarist Peter Bernstein leads an all-star quartet featuring pianist Brad Mehldau, bassist Christian McBride, and drummer Gregory Hutchinson for a double set of music recorded live at Jazz at Lincoln Center in NYC.

Rex Brown – Smoke On This… CD/LP (Metal/E1)
Brown wields a six-string guitar as confidently as he wore the bass in Pantera and Down. His engaging voice crackles with easygoing spirit and truth-telling power. It’s a crunchy drawl that’s down-to-earth, grippingly relatable, charmingly welcoming, and gritty, somewhere between the achingly resonant spiritual shamanism of Tom Waits and the instantly recognizable everyman AM radio vibes of Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers.

Byzantine – The Cicada Tree CD/2xLP (Metal Blade)
Muscular yet lithe riffs and fluid leads play against gripping, dynamic and at times unpredictable rhythms, while rich melodies and lyrics that are both involved and intelligent wind their way through every track of The Cicada Tree. The groove metal unit has continued their steady evolution – the interplay between their members organic and natural, imbuing the record’s sixty-two-minute running time with a freshness and urgency.

[Read more…] about New Releases for July 28, 2017

CDs + Vinyl:

Nicole Atkins – Goodnight Rhonda Lee CD/LP (Single Lock)
Nicole Atkins is a rare artist whose timeless songwriting and raw, emotional voice spans decades – a miasma of faded glamour and nostalgic pop noir. Nicole’s voice has always recalled a classic vinyl collection, a heir to the legacy of Roy Orbison, Lee Hazlewood, Sinatra, Aretha, Carole King and Candi Staton. However, she remains untethered to a decade or movement or the whim of the hipster elite. In order to capture the timelessness she sought for her fourth studio album Goodnight Rhonda Lee, Nicole enlisted a modern day Wrecking Crew, Niles City Sound in Fort Worth, TX who had just risen to national acclaim as Leon Bridges’ secret weapon, and co-writers like Chris Isaak and Jim Sclavunos (Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds).

Nick Cave & Warren Ellis – War Machine [A Netflix Original Film/OST] CD (Lakeshore)
Nick Cave and his Bad Seeds/Grinderman bandmate Warren Ellis composed the score for the Netflix film starring Brad Pitt, Tilda Swinton, Topher Grace, and more. “Together we made a score that was both light and dark, propulsive and meditative at the same time. We developed a kind of ‘spiritual electronics’ that captured both the melancholy and the terrible absurdity of the Afghan war,” the two of them said.

Dan Croll – Emerging Adulthood CD/LP (Communion)
There are multiple moments on Dan Croll’s extraordinary second album, Emerging Adulthood, which may cause you to question his sanity. Press play on the riotous “One Of Us” and prepare for the album’s purest pop moment. Soak up the dreamy “January Comes Too Soon” and sense the spirit of Earth, Wind & Fire summoned alongside vintage soul. Delve as deep as you dare into the Tijuana-tinged “Away From Today” and discover what could be the sound of a shotgun blast and crystal raindrops nestled next to a nod to the Pearl & Dean theme. Elsewhere, Emerging Adulthood sends languid lounge-jazz in to outer space, sets a metronome at the centre of a song, blends brass and breakbeats, finds common ground between the Beach Boys and ELO and Paul Simon and Pink Floyd and tells the tale of a phantom heart attack.

Cytoxin – Gammageddon CD/LP (Unique Leader)
The German death metal act returns after a five-year absence.

[Read more…] about New Releases for July 21, 2017

CDs + Vinyl

The Americans – I’ll Be Yours CD/LP (Loose)
Having started out as a roots band enthralled by pre-war American country and blues, The Americans have evolved into a blistering amalgamation of those influences, injected with a fiery blue-collar rock ‘n’ roll attitude, absorbing and reconfiguring the history of American music from Chuck Berry and Tom Waits to Bruce Springsteen. The band was plucked from obscurity by Jack White, T Bone Burnett and Robert Redford to appear in the PBS documentary series American Epic.

Apples – Mind Twister [Reissue/1978] CD/LP (Odion Livingstone)
An essential reissue from the Nigerian archives, the Afro-funk rarity Mind Twister.

Applewood Road – Applewood Road CD/LP+MP3 (Gearbox)
Applewood Road is singer-songwriters Emily Barker, Amber Rubarth and Amy Speace, who first met in Nashville in September 2014 where they wrote and recorded the song entitled “Applewood Road.” Six months later they reconvened to write twelve more songs and turn this exciting new collaboration into a full album project which was received to critical acclaim in 2016. The LP version is a limited package for the US market with an exclusive 7” single featuring “Losing My Religion” and “My Dear Companion” recorded live at Union Chapel in London. “Losing My Religion” also features as an extra track on the US version of the CD.

Bloodclot – Up In Arms CD/LP (Metal Blade)
At its purest, there is little that can match the visceral thrill and empowering spirit of hardcore. As frontman of New York City hardcore kings Cro-Mags, this is something John Joseph knows very well, and with Up In Arms, he and his Bloodclot compatriots deliver a furious collection that hits hard on every level. “In this band we’re doing what each of us have always done: give it our all,” he states plainly. Every track lives up to the rallying cry of the album’s title – the bursts of high energy hardcore act as the perfect accompaniment to Joseph setting his sights on injustice and the seemingly endless flaws of the contemporary world. From the moment the opening title track explodes to life, it’s clear that everyone involved is having a blast and playing from the heart, and that this is no frills / no bullsh*t music at its most passionate – every song evoking mental images of utter chaos in a heaving mosh pit.

Bonzie – Zone On Nine CD/LP (Beevine)
The second album from Chicago-based songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Bonzie, Zone On Nine pulls off the sublime feat of feeling both intensely intimate and otherworldly in scope. “All of my songs basically start as a conversation I’m having with myself alone in my room,” says 21-year-old Nina Ferraro, who’s created under the moniker of Bonzie since age 17. “It’s how I process and interpret things that have happened to me or in life in general; it’s my way of trying to understand the world.” Throughout Zone On Nine, Ferraro eschews the confessional singer-songwriter approach and claims her role as a fiercely honest observer and commentator who delivers her lyrics with powerful abandon. Kaleidoscopic in texture and spiked with startling intensity, the album opens with the jagged guitar riffs and measured fury of “Crescent.” That intensity sustains for the dusky urgency of songs like “Combback,” and for the synth-laced title track’s anthemic determination. “I think we’re here to experience things and express our experience, and to notice and enjoy how we each have our own different perspective,” says Ferraro. “I feel obligated to participate in life that way, on a very visceral level. To me there’s a rhythm that already exists in the world, and I want to be a part of that.”

Boris – Dear CD/2xLP+MP3 (Sargent House)
In the 25th year of their existence Boris deliver an album they describe as “heavenly-far beyond heavy.” Though Boris has traversed a broad swath of sonic territories, they have always been consistent in their embracing of excess, pushing their myriad of approaches and stylistic forays to points of intoxicating absurdity.

Breakfast Muff – Eurgh! CD/LP (Nuclear Blast)
Debut full physical album from the Glasgow three-piece. 13 tracks of in your face vitriolic punk thrash.

Cyrus Chestnut – There’s A Sweet, Sweet Spirit CD (HighNote)
A decorated veteran of the Betty Carter Trio, pianist Cyrus Chestnut came out the experience relatively unscathed with a style and directive clearly his own. It’s one steeped in the gospel church traditions of his native Baltimore, but also enlivened by an open ear aimed at a multitude of other influences. He has enjoyed stints with the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, Vanessa Williams, Freddie Hubbard and Joe Lovano. He also speaks fondly of his valuable tenures with vocalists Jon Hendricks and Joe Williams. With the fleetness of Bud Powell and his own distinctive two-handed lushly impressionistic harmonies, Cyrus offers an imaginative set with his long-time friends Buster Williams and Lenny White. Together they breathe new life into the venerable jazz piano trio format.

Alex Chilton – Baton Rouge 1985 CD (Klondike)
The entire Louisiana Public Broadcast (WLPB) of Alex Chilton performing live at the VFW Hall, Baton Rouge on September 27th, 1985.

[Read more…] about New Releases for July 14, 2017