And that's a perfectly fine thing these are somewhat more strict pop rock tunes, very ebullient with Edward Sharpeian singalong-baiting in "Don't Look Back" and "Metaphor" and sharp, well-designed guitar solos aplenty. Kind of reminiscent of The Go! Team, super happy anthemic shiny pulsing workout music. The final track, "The End Is Nigh", is actually very moving, but I still feel like these guys are too young to be sounding like old, out-of-touch nostalgia-mongers, and they've been doing this for too long to still be trying to work out a definitive sound.īorn Cages, The Sidelines EP. Even with the admittedly well-conceived horn parts and some lovely harmonies, the album is very pedestrian, which would be okay if it weren't so obviously stretching out for majesty. I think these guys are going for an Elbow-type thing, but the simplicity of the piano hooks never reaches universal beauty, the vocal melodies lilt without ever soaring, and lyrics like "These bulbs are the fluorescent kind/And no one looks good in this light" ("Careful What You Wish For") substitute awkward metaphors for insight. Put together so well it's too engaging to be oppressive.īell X1, Chop Chop. Screechy, tortured vocals rather than beefy growls, but downright beastly riffage and thick, plodding beats augmented tastefully by the occasional psychedelic flourish. Classic death/doom with musculature in all the right places.
Bits of garage and punk attitude, fairly catchy and yet essentially forgettable.īatillus, Concrete Sustain. These guys were clearly signed by a Minnesotan out of sheer state pride, and although they've got a lot a heart and surely some potential, this album sounds like middle-schoolers in a basement.īad Cop, Light On EP. His guitar player and drummer are similarly incompetent rhythmic mistakes abound, and that's to say nothing of the painfully generic blues-rock riffs.
4" and "Toast To The Land Of 10,000 Lakes", he has no control over it whatsoever. Perhaps he was drunk, trying to make his Jim Morrison impersonation all the more authentic? He actually has a pretty powerful voice, but as evidenced most plainly on tracks like "Engine No. Even if he's drunk, this makes no sense at all. "Half of them cocked to defend my girl", he then stammers. "There's too much guns in the world", he goes on I agree with the sentiment, but my English degree cringes. He's obviously trying to preempt my accusation that The 4onthefloor is the most unoriginal band I've heard in ages, but he has failed. On "Enough", the second track on Spirit Of Minneapolis, Gabriel Douglas sings, "There's too much music in this world/Nothing we haven't already heard". Read, give a listen, and maybe you'll find something you want to explore further. You really should write about it.' I'm resolved to be more timely and judicious about this process in 2014, but for now, here are mini-reviews of a crap-ton of albums from 2013 that I didn't buy (not yet, anyway), complete with mp3s. It's not as though I'm legally obligated to review any of it, but there's this nagging voice in my head that says 'You're listening to music you didn't pay for. Representatives from record labels and PR firms (and Swatty) are constantly giving me new music.
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