"Scratchcard Lanyard" #124 ALTER.NATION.MiX - weekly favtraX 08-04-2021 (19trx 1h 30m)

 ALTER.NATION #124(19trx 1h 30m)

Dry Cleaning, Ghlow, Mythic Sunship, La Femme, Du Blonde, Moontype, Flock of Dimes, Ryley Walker, Gary Bartz, Ali Shaheed Muhammad,Adrian Younge, Luca Yupanqui

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"Scratchcard Lanyard"

Wry, spoken word post-punk from South London four-piece. Combining Florence Shaw's detached spoken word vocals with intense post-punk instrumentation, Dry Cleaning's music contrasts the surreal and the mundane. 

Dry Cleaning - New Long Leg / Scratchcard Lanyard / Every Day Carry

...Working with producer John Parish, the band polishes their style like a blade on their debut album New Long Leg, and they contrast Shaw's understated delivery and their fired-up playing more sharply. When it comes to deadpan yet nuanced vocalists, Shaw rivals Kim Gordon and Laurie Anderson. With the way she casts a critical eye on the world with erudite confidence, it only makes sense that she has a background as a university lecturer, and as she subverts the usual expectations of female vocalists to be emotive or decorative, her profound, mundane, and odd observations unite in a surreal blur. On "Scratchcard Lanyard," one of New Long Leg's finest moments, she intones "I've come here to make a ceramic shoe...I've come here to learn how to mingle" and its putative chorus "Do everything/Feel nothing" with the same emotional weight, brilliantly conveying her feelings of ennui and overwhelm... the transporting solos guitarist Tom Dowse contributes to almost every track. And while Dry Cleaning downplays pop music's most familiar techniques -- easily identifiable verses, choruses, and vocal melodies -- New Long Leg never really feels alienating, even when the band takes tension and release to extremes on "Every Day Carry." They know exactly what they're doing, and the risks they take result in a debut album that brings a fresh energy to post-punk that's equally challenging and rewarding.

Swedish-Russian duo who merge post-punk, electroclash, and industrial influences into a heavy blend. Dark alternative duo Ghlow twist industrial, post-punk, electronica, and metal influences into a potent blend that recalls acts such as the Raveonettes, Crystal Castles, and Curve. 

Ghlow - Slash and Burn / Not Fit For This / Hollow

Four years after their conception, Swedish-Russian alternative duo Ghlow released their official debut full-length, Slash and Burn. A potent blend of their varied influences -- post-punk, electronica, industrial, and doom metal, to name a few -- the set makes up for brevity by offering a tight, corrosive assault that recalls acts like the Raveonettes, the Jesus and Mary Chain, and Curve. Vocalist Emille de Blanche is a force, holding her own atop the noisy release crafted by Nikolay Evdokimov as expertly as Toni Halliday, Shirley Manson, and Jehnny Beth in their own respective groups...

Heavy instrumental band from Copenhagen taking notes from the limitlessness of free jazz and the volume of '70s psych. Danish psych-rockers Mythic Sunship look to the cosmic journeying of the 1970s Krautrock and free jazz scenes as well as the volume of early proto-metal for a sound that hedges toward the heavier side of exploratory instrumental rock.

Mythic Sunship - Wildfire / Maelstrom / Landfall

Copenhagen-based instrumental quintet Mythic Sunship have explored the intersection of psychedelic rock and free jazz prolifically, releasing sprawling albums almost once a year since their inception around the start of the 2010s. Sixth album Wildfire finds the band in a state of chaotic upheaval as always, but pushes their sound to even more frenetic places than usual... As Mythic Sunship continue to evolve at a rapid pace, this chapter of their development is one of the strongest and most immediate. Wildfire is alive with euphoric joy, and the energy is both unrelenting and contagious.

Avant-indie-electronic collective led by main songwriters Marlon Magnée and Sacha Got. The Parisian collective La Femme combines its French heritage with sounds from across the globe in surprising and appealing ways.

La Femme - Paradigmes / Paradigme / Cool Colorado

With each album, La Femme's musical horizons have widened significantly -- an impressive feat, considering that their 2013 debut album, Psycho Tropical Berlin, already blended Krautrock, surf, coldwave, psychedelic rock, and yé-yé... they discover plenty of new territory on Paradigmes... More often, though, La Femme take their listeners on a style-hopping journey. In its first few songs alone, Paradigmes ranges from the silvery processed vocals and wailing brass of the title track, which feels like a number from a retro sci-fi musical... "Cool Colorado" is a laid-back homage that drifts along like a puff of pot smoke, and hearing about cowboys and Sweet Georgia Brown in a thick French accent over groovy brass and tambourines goes a long way toward making them seem cool again... La Femme's passion for seeking out new (or vintage) sounds to add to their omnivorous pop is contagious, and never more so than on Paradigmes.

The fiery, fearless rock project of musician, composer, animator, and video director Beth Jeans Houghton. Du Blonde 's swaggering, heart-on-sleeve rock came into being when musician, composer, animator, and video director Beth Jeans Houghton reinvented her music.

Du Blonde - Homecoming / Pull The Plug / Take Me Away

On the gritty, underappreciated Lung Bread for Daddy, Du Blonde's Beth Jeans Houghton dove into the messiness of heartache and mental health issues; on Homecoming, she looks at them from the other side. Just as her previous album's grungy textures heightened its angst, the slick shine she uses here adds layers of resonance. Homecoming is pop on Houghton's terms: She puts a candy coating over her anxiety and frustration... 

Indie trio who fuse fuzzy alt-rock, punchy guitar pop, and intimate singer/songwriter fare under the direction of songwriter Margaret McCarthy. A fusion of fuzzy alt-rock, punchy guitar pop, and yearning singer/songwriter components, Moontype evolved from the spare, voice-and-bass guitar demos of songwriter Margaret McCarthy.

Moontype - Bodies of Water / Anti-Divinity / Stuck On You

Beginning life as the skeletal bass guitar demos of vocalist/songwriter Margaret McCarthy, Bodies of Water is the debut album of Chicago-based indie rock trio Moontype. What the songs evolved into is something not only fleshy and urgent but often raucous and shape-shifting, with the band noting that they often let McCarthy's intimate lyrics dictate rhythms. As a result, tracks like "When Will I Learn," "Blue Michigan," and the lonesome "Stuck on You" are among others that feature subtly shifting meters. The latter song also reveals some of the country music background of guitarist (and one-time jazz performance major) Ben Cruz and drummer Emerson Hunton, who also play together in projects spanning jazz and avant-garde music. The track's quiet, galloping rhythm manifests in skittering snare, a lively bass line, and rhythmically animated guitar, albeit with a limited range, at least until Cruz breaks out a solo to end the song. .. Throughout the album, McCarthy's vulnerable confessions and airy vocals unite an ultimately compelling set of songs that may appeal to noise rock and indie singer/songwriter fans alike.

Wye Oak's Jenn Wasner explores more-intimate, dreamy pop with her solo side project. The solo project of Wye Oak singer/guitarist Jenn Wasner, Flock of Dimes finds the songwriter exploring the more intimate, atmospheric side of pop with her dreamy musical excursions.

Flock of Dimes - Head of Roses / Price of Blue / Hard Way

On her luminous and sometimes piercing sophomore LP, Jenn Wasner struggles through the overwhelming nature of heartbreak, coming to grips with the conflicting roles of both the breaker and the broken. Written in quarantine and recorded with a trusted cadre of collaborators, Head of Roses builds on the singer/songwriter's growing canon of intimate yet approachable art-pop which she releases under the name Flock of Dimes. Ultimately more layered and complex than Wasner's work as part of Wye Oak, Flock of Dimes' material manages to express an acute vulnerability without becoming stuck in the quagmire of deflated confessionalism...

An accomplished fingerstyle guitarist and singer/songwriter whose recordings run the gamut from folk to rock to experimental music. Ryley Walker is an accomplished fingerstyle guitarist, singer, and songwriter from Chicago whose music and evolution as an artist have proven mercurial...

Ryley Walker - Course in Fable  / Striking Down Your Big Premiere / A Lenticular Slap

At some point during this busy stretch, he also found time to compose and record some of his most intricate and satisfying solo material to date, released here as Course in Fable, Walker's fifth album. An artful nexus of impressionistic songwriting, prog-rock vision, and melodic nuance...Album opener "Striking Down Your Big Premiere" leans heavily into its progressive nature, shifting seamlessly between time signatures and conjoined micro-suites to create a surprisingly effective whole. The musical interplay between Walker, guitarist Bill McKay (another Chicagoan), bassist Andrew Scott Young, and drummer Ryan Jewell is simply electric, and his increasing confidence as an ace bandleader makes it all feel effortless... Walker may tip his hat to Chicago's experimental underground or prog behemoths like Genesis, but with this release, he's very much his own man.

Gary Bartz - An assertive and agile post-bop alto saxophonist who has dabbled in fusion and funk. / Ali Shaheed Muhammad - Pivotal player with A Tribe Called Quest, and also a successful producer (D'Angelo's "Brown Sugar") and collaborator with Adrian Younge, among others. / Adrian Younge - All-around talent with an uncanny ability to transform his obsession with late-'60s and early-'70s music into unique, impeccably made projects.

Gary Bartz / Ali Shaheed Muhammad / Adrian Younge - Gary Bartz JID006 / Spiritual Ideation / Blue Jungles

The Jazz Is Dead project curated by producer/multi-instrumentalists Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Adrian Younge operates with a particular m.o. The duo enlist a revered jazz musician whose work and influence have reached past the genre. They surround him with players -- including themselves -- and the same vintage equipment used on their storied catalog dates to create new music. Alto giant and composer Gary Bartz checks all the boxes. In addition to early stints with jazz masters Miles Davis and McCoy Tyner, Bartz cut a series of groundbreaking albums under his own name and with his N.T.U. ... Opener "Spiritual Ideation" is introduced by a harpsichord and a funky snare shuffle. A gently bumping bassline welcomes Bartz's alto. He enters on the modal melody, and immediately begins to embellish, append, and expand it. The backing singers wordlessly create an ethereal dimension... 

Gary Bartz

Child of artists Elizabeth Hart and Iván Diaz Mathé, who used MIDI technology to record an experimental album while their baby was in utero.

Luca Yupanqui - Sounds of the Unborn / V5

Sounds of the Unborn was recorded by Psychic Ills bassist Elizabeth Hart and Argentine producer Iván Diaz Mathé while Hart was pregnant with their daughter, Luca Yupanqui. Using biosonic MIDI technology, the pair attached devices to Hart's belly and translated the vibrations and heartbeats into sound waves, controlling synthesizers and producing improvised, free-flowing electronic music. .. The audio itself is a strange mélange of rapidly pulsating heartbeats, amniotic textures, and reflexive movements, resembling an unstructured blend of dark ambient, post-industrial, and glitch. It's entirely at home on a label that sometimes releases horror film scores -- the clattering, swooping opening piece "V5" could easily soundtrack an intense psychological thriller...

Dry Cleaning, Ghlow, Mythic Sunship, La Femme, Du Blonde, Moontype, Flock of Dimes, Ryley Walker, Gary Bartz, Ali Shaheed Muhammad,Adrian Younge, Luca Yupanqui

"Halcyon" #119 ALTER.NATION.MiX - weekly favtraX 02-03-2021 (20trx 1h 15m)

 ALTER.NATION #119 (20trx 1h 15m)

Lost Horizons, François & the Atlas Mountains, Julien Baker,  Black Nash, Altin Gün, Nightshift, King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Cloud Nothings, Alice Cooper, Mouse on Mars, Adrian Younge, Menahan Street Band

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"H a l c y o n"

Haunting indie pop from the duo of Bella Union label-runner Simon Raymonde (Cocteau Twins) and drummer Richard Thomas (Dif Juz), with singing guests.

Lost Horizons - In Quiet Moments / Halcyon feat. Penelope Isles /  Unravelling In Slow Motion feat. Ren Harvieu

When the duo of Simon Raymonde (Cocteau Twins) and Richard Thomas (Dif Juz) released Ojalá, their debut album as Lost Horizons, in late 2017, it marked a return to recording for both for the first time in 20 years. Motivated by a world in need of hope as well as a return to music-making, the 15-track set consisted of improvisation-based instrumentals that Raymonde (bass, guitar, keyboards, production) and Thomas (drums, additional keys and guitar) then passed along to collaborators, who were tasked with adding lyrics and vocals. They take the same approach three years later with the 16-song In Quiet Moments, this time with themes of death and rebirth suggested to the lyricists. (Raymonde's mother had died in the interim.)... In Quiet Moments begins with "Halcyon," featuring Penelope Isles. They're one of a handful of representatives here from Raymonde's Bella Union label, which also houses Lost Horizons. The song sets the mood with a haunting indie rock created with a low pitch range (established by bass guitar), ringing guitar tones, wistful chord colors, and ghostly, wordless vocals before the plaintive main melody even makes its entrance. At that point, the track remains atmospheric in nature -- as does the album -- with hard-to-discern lyrics, weeping guitar riffs, and a steady, middling tempo. The tone throughout In Quiet Moments tends toward an eerie, even foreboding poignance, if one with grooving rhythms and occasionally brighter arrangements... Ren Harvieu's "Unravelling in Slow Motion," which opts for a smoky, jazz lounge feel...

Globally-inspired indie pop ensemble formed in the U.K. and led by French singer/songwriter François Marry.

François & the Atlas Mountains - Banane Bleue / Par le passé / Tourne Autour

...Ironically, the sixth release by his longtime band is essentially another solo outing, this time in collaboration with Finnish synth pop producer Jaakko Eino Kalevi. Breezier and more playful than some of his recent releases, Banane Bleue (yes, that translates to Blue Banana in English) is also smaller in scale, with Marry often relying on borrowed instruments and makeshift recording spaces... Less busy than some of the group's mid-2010s albums, Banane Bleue opts for more minimal arrangements with softly pulsing synths, bright guitars, shimmering harmonies, and a surprising amount of pop hooks... 

Memphis-based singer/songwriter with a knack for finding the shaky ground between heart-wrenching and cathartic.

Julien Baker - Little Oblivions / Ringside / Favor

Julien Baker's third album, Little Oblivions, follows her first appearance on the Billboard 200 with 2017's Turn Out the Lights as well as a full-length collaboration with like-minded singer/songwriters Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus under the handle Boygenius. Giving the impression of being ready for bigger stages, Little Oblivions turns up the volume and expands arrangements, including notably adding a consistent rhythm section to her songs for the first time. Beyond mere "full-band arrangement," though, tracks like "Ringside" ... It's a sharp contrast to her sparse and brittle debut, though the music remains almost entirely self-made, with Baker performing all but an "additional instrumentation" credit from engineer Calvin Lauber and backing vocals by Dacus and Bridgers on one track ("Favor")... "How long do I have until I've spent up everyone's good will?" ("Favor") populate emo-adjacent songs about waning faith, drinking, depression, and doomed relationships. There are glimmers of gratitude alongside the masochistic ideation of entries including "Ringside," where she casts herself as her own opponent in the ring. That song also deviates from typically rising and falling, sine wave-shaped instrumentation patterns, opting instead of constantly churning accompaniment...

Solo project of versatile songwriter Jody Smith that began to take shape when he finished a five-year stint of military service.

Black Nash - Black Nash / Love Underwater / Burn My Body Down

...melding the daydreamy funk of Unknown Mortal Orchestra's danciest moments with the damaged, lo-fi production of artists like Homeshake or Cleaners from Venus. Smith doesn't stay in one mode for long, though, even within the same song. Album standout "Love Underwater" begins as a sunny acoustic tune and grows increasingly psychedelic as surreal lyrics about dolphins and the C.I.A. and layers of wild guitar overdubs or distorted drums enter the mix. Smith's songwriting style nods to insular, curious talents like Emmit Rhodes or Alex Chilton, but he always dismantles his songs before they get too easily digestible...

Part Dutch, part Turkish combo dedicated to updating the psychedelic sounds of '70s Turkey, adding deep funk and synthesizers to the mix.

Altin Gün - Yol / Ordunun Dereleri

On their second album, Gece, Altin Gün perfected their updated version of the Turkish psychedelia of the late '60s/early '70s. The group of musicians from Holland and Turkey gave familiar Turkish folk songs a gleaming upgrade that combined bouncy rhythms with soaring electric saz lines, heartfelt vocals, and an overall feel of psychedelic warmth that was at once comforting and thrillingly new. Not content to repeat themselves, the band altered the approach and sound on 2021's Yol in a couple important ways. Thanks to the global pandemic, they weren't able to work together in a studio and instead traded ideas over email and shared files... It's a little shocking the first time "Ordunun Dereleri" -- which has all the rain-streaked windshield melancholy of Chromatics...

The band that became NIGHTSHIFT formed in 2019 in the ecosystem of Glasgow’s current indie scene...  The band was formed by David Campbell (guitar), Andrew Doig (bass), Eothen Stearn (keyboards/vocals) & Chris White (drums) as a “No Wave/No New York/early Sonic Youth/This Heat-esque” group, but their sound quickly evolved once guitarist/vocalist/clarinetist Georgia Harris joined (as the band was writing “Zöe“).

Nightshift - Zöe / Outta Space / Power Cut

After an album that saw the Glasgow combo Nightshift diving deep into noisy, off-kilter post-punk, they return with something more tightly wound and sparse that separates them from other bands plying a similar trade. Due to restrictions on recording in studios, the group worked remotely on Zöe, laying down loops and adding parts piece by piece in their respective homes. Whatever might have been lost by subtracting the energy of people playing together in the same room is offset by the home-cooked care put into the construction of the songs. Each track feels like it was painstakingly assembled out of scraps of sound, sewn together seamlessly and in fascinating ways.... This may only be Nightshift's second album, but it feels like the work of a well-seasoned group who have perfected their approach and sound.

Australian psychedelic collective with an intense work ethic and a wildly experimental outlook that reaches from synth prog to folk rock.

King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard - L.W.  / East West Link / O.N.E.

While in lockdown, the dudes in King Gizzard spent their time recording songs. No shock there since that's just about all they seem to do given the prodigious output. In fact, they made enough for two albums... but 2021's L.W. somehow succeeds in ways that K.G. didn't. Maybe it's simply that the band might have saved the better songs for this record. Almost everything here sounds like they are firing on all cylinders; whether it's the rambling road-trip rock of "East West Link," the funky clavinet jam "If Not Now, Then When?," boogie rock-adjacent "Ataraxia," or 100 mph psychedelic blowout "See Me," the band come across with more vigor and verve than they did on K.G. Even when they slow things down, like on the evil-sounding swamp rocker "O.N.E."...

Cleveland, Ohio band that balances hardcore intensity and deceptively sweet melodies.

Cloud Nothings - The Shadow I Remember / The Spirit Of / A Longer Moon

Since Attack on Memory, Cloud Nothings have more than proven themselves as a formidable rock band. However, there's always been something special about Dylan Baldi's pithy, poignant pop songs. While most of the group's albums featured at least one or two of these gems, The Shadow I Remember is the first to focus on this side of Baldi's music since Cloud Nothings moved out of his bedroom. Baldi and company also come full circle with the album's creation: they recorded it with Steve Albini at his Electrical Audio studio, where they made Attack. In their own way, The Shadow I Remember's compact, hooky outbursts are just as potent as the slow-burning epics on Cloud Nothings' other albums. They're so seasoned that they can shift from bouncy to crushing and back again in a blink on "The Spirit Of," ... "A Longer Moon" give the song an impressively cosmic sweep. By revisiting their past, Cloud Nothings find something new in it, as well as something timeless, and The Shadow I Remember is a full-throated, full-hearted triumph.

Pacific Northwest doom-grunge gods who were legendarily Kurt Cobain's favorite band.

Melvins - Working With God / Negative No No

As the years turned into decades, grunge forecasters the Melvins became more and more mercurial in their overall concept of where the band began and ended... Los Melvins were an incarnation including founding Melvin King Buzzo, longtime mainstay Dale Crover, and original drummer Mike Dillard. Working with God reunites this lineup (also sometimes referred to as "Melvins 1983" due to Dillard and Buzzo's 1983 formation of the band) for an album that includes returns to the band's early, sludgy power as well as some of the goofy juvenilia and lighthearted freakery of their 2010s output... With nothing to prove and never having seemed too concerned about impressing anyone, the Melvins continue to take their wild-eyed chaos anywhere they choose -- Working with God goes to some places that are strange and unforeseen even for them.

Pioneers of heavy rock and masters of shock rock in the early '70s, whose titular lead singer became a successful solo artist.

Alice Cooper - Detroit Stories / Rock & Roll (Lou Reed - The Velvet Underground cover)

.On his 2019 EP Breadcrumbs, shock rock pioneer Alice Cooper paid tribute to his hometown of Detroit... Cooper's longtime producer Bob Erzin delivers the same thick, powerful sound he's achieved on many of Cooper's post-2000s albums, with booming heavy metal drums, walls of guitar, and Cooper's sinister vocals high in the mix... Detroit Stories is stuck in a confusing limbo somewhere between tribute to Detroit and another album of the kind of campy, theatrical, radio-geared hard rock Cooper has been turning in since Hey Stoopid...

Highly inventive, genre-defying duo who became German electronic music legends.

Mouse on Mars - AAI / The Latent Space

On AAI, Mouse on Mars once again reinvent the tireless creativity that's driven them since the beginning of their career. After chopping up the vocals and performances of Bon Iver's Justin Vernon and the National's Bryce Dessner and abstracting them into electronic anonymity on their previous album Dimensional People, this time Andi Toma and Jan St. Werner take the opposite approach: They synthesize the soul of artificial intelligence and give it a voice... The narrative style Mouse on Mars flirted with on Dimensional People blossoms on AAI's fully formed world-building: On "The Latent Space," wild electro-acoustic polyrhythms and sprightly vocalizations evoke a virtual gestation that sets the stage for the AI's evolution over the course of the album...

All-around talent with an uncanny ability to transform his obsession with late-'60s and early-'70s music into unique, impeccably made projects.

Adrian Younge - The American Negro / Rotten Roses

The American Negro is an unapologetic critique, detailing the systemic and malevolent psychology that afflicts people of color.  This project dissects the chemistry behind blind racism, using music as the medium to restore dignity and self-worth to my people.  It should be evident that any examination of black music is an examination of the relationship between black and white America.  This relationship has shaped the cultural evolution of the world and its negative roots run deep into our psyche. .. Vocals: Performed by Loren Oden, Chester Gregory and Sam Harmonix

This loose-knit crew of Brooklyn soul and funk players is comprised of members of the Dap-Kings, Antibalas, the Budos Band, and others.

Menahan Street Band - The Exciting Sounds of Menahan Street Band / The Duke

Proud sons of the extended Daptone Records family (though they officially record for their sibling label Dunham Records), the Menahan Street Band often get lumped in with the neo-soul revival, largely thanks to their label associations and their work backing up powerhouse R&B vocalist Charles Bradley. However, while 2021's The Exciting Sounds of the Menahan Street Band sounds very soulful indeed, it doesn't often sound like soul music. On these 14 instrumental tracks, the band's music frequently plays like a collection of soundtrack pieces to forgotten movies and television shows of the '70s... and if you're looking for cool atmospheres for your home or automobile with a large percentage of vintage flair, this is an ideal aural backdrop, not to mention a showcase for some excellent instrumentalists with an appreciation of things past and present.

Lost Horizons, François & the Atlas Mountains, Julien Baker,  Black Nash,Altin Gün, Nightshift, King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Cloud Nothings, Alice Cooper, Mouse on Mars, Adrian Younge, Menahan Street Band

"Love Is A Deserter" #112 ALTER.NATION.MiX - weekly favtraX 13-12-2020

 

 ALTER.NATION #112

The Kills, Kamasi Washington, Guided by Voices, Xyla, The Kills, Osees, Thee Oh Sees, Doug Carn, Ali Saheed Mhuhammad, Adrian Younge, Lonnie Holley, Liturgy

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"Love Is A Deserter"

An Anglo-American duo that plays fiery garage rock with blues grit, new wave cool, and loads of feedback.

The Kills - Little Bastards / Love Is A Deserter (XFM Session)

A good sign that a band is on a creative hot streak is the amount of music they release outside of their albums. As the B-sides and rarities collection Little Bastards shows, Jamie Hince and Alison Mosshart were barely keeping up with their muse during their first decade as the Kills. Named for the Roland 880 sequencer/drum machine that gave the duo's early work its signature throb, Little Bastards is an apt description of these stray songs that deserve more love... While it's one of the collection's earliest recordings, it shows that Hince and Mosshart knew what they were doing from the start. Not only does Little Bastards get at everything that makes the Kills equally enduring and inventive, it's a lot of fun, too.

Celebrated, award-winning Los Angeles saxophonist and composer whose albums have spearheaded a renaissance in jazz.

Kamasi Washington - Becoming / I Am Becoming

In scoring Becoming, director Nadia Hallgren's Michelle Obama documentary, saxophonist, composer, and arranger Kamasi Washington reveals a side of his musical universe we've not encountered on his own sprawling, spiritually inspired albums. He drew inspiration from Hallgren's counsel, her narrative frames, and Obama's life and musical tastes -- he listened to her playlists in preparation... "I Am Becoming" frames a resonant Hi Records-inspired soul melody with wordless backing vocals adding a gospel feel atop an emergent B-3, piano, keys, and strings. Washington leads the solos with a meaty, reedy tenor break followed by electric guitar and muted trombone...

Long-running band led by Robert Pollard who revolutionized indie rock with ever-evolving lo-fi pop created by a rotating cast.

Guided by Voices - Styles We Paid For / War of the Devils

...It's hard to imagine an artist better suited to capitalize on a year of enforced lockdown than Pollard, especially when his productivity was already through the roof. That the indie rock titans already had enough quality material in the tank after 2019's bounty to trot out two more full-lengths during a global pandemic was an impressive feat, and Styles We Paid For is no slouch of a record, especially given that it was completed in quarantine with the bandmembers trading files from their respective home studios. Originally envisioned as an entirely analog set called Before Computers, Pollard and bandmates Doug Gillard (guitar), Bobby Bare, Jr. (guitar), Mark Shue (bass), and Kevin March (drums) gamely readjusted their approach to suit the times and continued their hot streak with another reliably solid latter-day release. 

San Francisco-based artist who released their debut album Ways on Leaving Records.

Xyla - Ways / Narcissus

When, toward the beginning of 2020, Xyla began crafting the tracks that would become her debut album, she was in what she has described as a “vulnerable” place. After six years in San Francisco, where she had moved from Houston to study French horn at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, she had spent a few months in Berlin, soaking up the city’s electronic-music scene. It was a heady time: She clubbed by night and made music by day, gathering inspiration from the unfamiliar city around her. But upon her return to the Bay Area, her spirits came crashing down... The album reaches its emotional peak with the jazz-sampling “Narcissus.” Hi-hats tap like nervous fingers drumming on the kitchen table, and the way the beat stops and starts reinforces a curious mood that’s both ruminative and distracted. Her arrangement captures a curious heart-in-mouth feeling—not quite a fight-or-flight instinct, but a sense that something needs to change, if only the exit strategy would reveal itself. Then, after a few seconds of silence, it does just that: Her drum programming straightens out and plunges ahead, haloed by gentle chimes...

An Anglo-American duo that plays fiery garage rock with blues grit, new wave cool, and loads of feedback.

The Kills - Little Bastards / I Call It Art

A good sign that a band is on a creative hot streak is the amount of music they release outside of their albums. As the B-sides and rarities collection Little Bastards shows, Jamie Hince and Alison Mosshart were barely keeping up with their muse during their first decade as the Kills. Named for the Roland 880 sequencer/drum machine that gave the duo's early work its signature throb, Little Bastards is an apt description of these stray songs that deserve more love...

Influential California combo that mixes wild garage-punk noise and unhinged psychedelic exploration with occasional bouts of prog and metal.

Osees / Thee Oh Sees   Panther Rotate / Gong Experiment

Hot on the heels of their late-2020 album Protean Threat, the ever-prolific Osees released a companion album of sorts made up of drastically remixed tracks, found sounds, manipulated field recordings, and general weirdness under the name Panther Rotate... It certainly doesn't rock as hard as an Osees album, but the mind-blowing nature of Dwyer's work remains intact and there's absolutely no reason anyone already under the band's spell shouldn't find Panther Rotate to be another vital and inspiring piece of the Oh Sees/Osees puzzle.

Doug Carn is an American jazz musician, multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger, and producer. He is best known for four recordings on the Black Jazz label between 1971 and 1973...

As a member of A Tribe Called Quest, Ali Shaheed Muhammad played a pivotal role in the evolution of rap music throughout the 1990s, factoring in the development of the jazz-rooted, sample-based production approach that epitomized Native Tongues...

Adrian Younge was known foremost as an entertainment law professor when he provided the score for the blaxploitation homage Black Dynamite (2009)...

Doug Carn / Ali Saheed Mhuhammad / Adrian Younge - Doug Carn / Dimensions

Doug Carn is one of the finest Hammond B-3 organists alive. Also known as a fine pianist among jazz aficionados, he's spent the last six years leading the post-bop West Coast Organ Band. To producers/multi-instrumentalists Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Carn is a primary influence, the creative mind behind four seminal spiritual jazz-funk albums made for Black Jazz during the 1970s, including the oft-sampled Infant Eyes and Adam's Apple. He is a perfect subject for the fifth Jazz Is Dead project. Recorded on vintage gear at L.A.'s Linear Labs Studio, these analog recordings meld grooves from jazz, soul, funk, hip-hop, Afro-Latin, and Brazilian styles in startling new ways... Carn plays organ exclusively on ten of these eleven collectively written cuts. Muhammad and Younge, in addition to co-composing and producing, play electric bass and Rhodes piano respectively. The house band also includes drummer Malachi Morehead, alto saxophonist Shai Golan, and trumpeter Zach Ramacier. "Dimensions" emerges with a glimmering, reverbed Rhodes and softly swelling B-3 in a circular, chromatic progression. The band responds with tight, butt-shaking, interlocking grooves. The scalar progression remains but is dominated by Morehead's slamming beats, Carn's meaty organ fills, and Muhammad's aggressive, rubbery bass line; combined, they provide the master key for the jazz-funk lock. 

Known throughout the art world for his found-object sculptures, paintings, and installations, American artist Lonnie Holley gained a new audience when he started releasing and performing his music during the 2010s.

Lonnie Holley - National Freedom / Like Hell Broke Away

...The more ambitious "Like Hell Broke Away" can be described as dark psychedelic doo wop, as Holley pleads to a lover who wants to throw him out, surrounded by multi-tracked howls and moans as well as swirling, levitating guitar licks... He absolutely hammers the keys while wailing about the history of humanity from Biblical times to modern-day civil rights struggles, and it's one of the most inspired recordings he's ever made.

A Brooklyn, New York-based "transcendental black metal" band, as provocative for its aesthetics as for its music.

Liturgy - Origin of the Alimonies / The Fall of SIHEYMN

...Liturgy’s black metal core, built around Hunt-Hendrix’s time-stretching “burst beats,” remains intact, thanks to the return of the athletic quartet that debuted on H.A.Q.Q. But a gaggle of marquee New York improvisers—trumpeter Nate Wooley, flautist Eve Essex, bassist James Ilgenfritz, and so on—broaden Liturgy’s textures and techniques. Scraped violin strings chatter with tremolo guitars. Pounded piano figures complicate splenetic rhythms. At one point, during “The Fall of SIHEYMEN,” Liturgy sound like a symphony being led by John Zorn toward the Naked City...

The Kills, Kamasi Washington, Guided by Voices,  Xyla, The Kills, Osees, Thee Oh Sees, Doug Carn, Ali Saheed Mhuhammad, Adrian Younge, Lonnie Holley, Liturgy