Broken Social Scene were the band to be a decade ago. They had two critically acclaimed albums under their belt: 2002’s You Forgot It In People and 2005’s Broken Social Scene. They had a devoted enough following to sell out three nights in a row at the same venue. And perhaps most importantly, they became […]
Review: Broken Social Scene – Hug of Thunder Read More »
There’s a general consensus in music that you need multiple musicians to form a band, while an individual is considered solo artist or a singer-songwriter. If only it were that simple. Multiple indie acts over the years have muddied these definitions, making it difficult to tell where the line is drawn. Bright Eyes revolved
Review: The Drums – Abysmal Thoughts Read More »
When Phoenix hit it big in 2009 with their hits “Lizstomania” and “1901” off the album Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, there were a couple surprises in store for their newly-acquired legion of listeners. First, that the band had been around for quite a while – Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix was actually their fourth album (they released
Review: Phoenix – Ti Amo Read More »
The ungoogleable band !!! (pronounced ‘chk-chk-chk’) has long been a prime candidate for a “best of” album. Their studio albums to date have been decent enough, but each contained one or two tracks that blew all the others clear out of the water. Just to name some examples, their self-titled album had “KooKooKa Fuk-U,” Louden
Review: !!! – Shake the Shudder Read More »
It’s easy enough to describe the New Pornographers’ music. Over the course of six studio albums released in just under a decade and a half, the band has created an incredibly distinctive style of upbeat indie rock filled with pop hooks and singalong choruses. Pinning them down is something else entirely. The New Pornographers are
Review: The New Pornographers – Whiteout Conditions Read More »
Ah Conor Oberst. Feels like it was just the other day that I was writing about him… Oh wait, that’s because he only released the album Ruminations in October of last year. If you’re thinking five months is a relatively short gap between albums, realize that Ruminations was a fairly bare bones release. It consisted
Review: Conor Oberst – Salutations Read More »
Getting into indie music can seem overwhelming at first. The umbrella term “indie” seems to encompass an endless supply of bands, and trying to find the scene’s critically acclaimed heavyweights is fairly time-consuming. Even when these bands are discovered, listening to their complete discography can seem daunting, especially when members are involved in solo and
Top 10 Influential Indie Albums Read More »
Reading the titles of Canadian indie rock duo Japandroids’ albums gives you a fairly good sense of what they’re all about. Their 2009 debut Post-Nothing suggests a band lacking a grand vision of what they’re supposed to be, bucking subgenre designations like “post-punk” and “post-rock” in the process. More descriptive is the band’s 2012 sophomore
Review: Japandroids – Near to the Wild Heart of Life Read More »
For a band that seemingly emerged out of nowhere, the xx have made an impressive impact. Their 2009 debut xx received unanimous critical acclaim and won the 2010 Mercury Prize, despite relatively little radio play and the absence of any singles that could be called a “hit.” More importantly, the band’s sound became highly influential
Review: The xx – I See You Read More »
Alright, we all know 2016 was a pretty terrible year, so I’m not going to beat a dead horse here. Instead, I’d like to focus on some of the great music released these past twelve months. While 2015 gave us some impressive debuts and high-quality albums by bands that have yet to let us down,
The Top 10 Albums of 2016 Read More »
While 2016 has been generally considered a terrible year for humanity, it at least gave it us some great albums that we will remember for years to come, and hopefully disassociate from the events that have occurred these past twelve months. This is not a list of those albums. Instead, this list is for great
The Top 10 Songs of 2016 (That Aren’t from the Top 10 Albums) Read More »
Pitchfork recently released their “Best Music Videos of 2016” countdown, and I couldn’t help but feel the list will be strongly correlated with their top albums and top songs lists, and not based on the merit of the videos alone. This seems to echo the trend of MTV’s Video Music Awards, where popular artists dominate
Top 10 Indie Music Videos of 2016 Read More »
You must be logged in to post a comment.