Author: Nicole

I admit it, reviewing Future Islands was incredibly hard merely because I’ve been into them for a few years now. So, am I objective? Probably not. Check out a teaser from my review at Treblezine:

Vocalist Sam Herring says that calling Future Islands’ newest album Singles is an act of bravado. Every track is so good that each one could be a single. He’s not that far off, really, but there are key differences between this 2014 release and their others that fans won’t recognize as typical of their sound. Once billed as the constant underdog, Herring has come hard onstage this year, punches flying, or in his case, churning out inimitable dance moves — pure Herring — so good that the only appropriate response is to love him for his raw, uncensored expression. He’s the alpha dog now, prepared to take his prize at the front of a band with the power to win over David Letterman and land a plum spot at this year’s Coachella. [Read More]

Back in 1997, a Los Angeles band called Kara’s Flowers made their debut with The Fourth World, an album with a sound reminiscent of contemporary alt-rock fare like Weezer and Green Day. Yet, despite their loyal following, massive hooks and the backing of a big-time producer (Rob Cavallo), their only album had little success and their label, Reprise, dropped them. Not that this was the end, necessarily. Four years later, they re-emerged with a new sound, a little more experience and a completely new identity. The punchline? They changed their name to Maroon 5.

Kara’s Flowers is just a recent example in a long line of rock band identity shifts, and it certainly worked out for their bank accounts. But even rarer is the band that starts anew for the sake of hitting reset on their art. In their time together, San Diego based Cuckoo Chaos released some upbeat, groove-heavy tracks, got some positive exposure, left their impact at CMJ and garnered some positive press in the process. Now they’ve dropped the Cuckoo Chaos moniker and reformed as Deadphones with their first album out on Waaga Records.  {Read More}

Blue Film is the kind of freshman album that excites the nerves with the thrill of discovery, like The xx’s first album or Pure Heroine, the debut album by New Zealand success story Lorde — with whom Lo-Fang is currently on tour. But Blue Film is a thing apart—and while comparisons are inevitable, the album rides its own heights, suspended deliciously over staccato strings and choppy keys that conjure images of exotic locales. Lo-Fang crafted the heart of Blue Film across several years, traveling in the United States and abroad, with a National Geographic photographer and friend, to places like Cambodia and Iceland, where musical influences surfaced, however subtly, in tracks like “#88” and “Confusing Happiness.”

Despite making an important connection in Lorde, Lo-Fang is the farthest thing from a name-dropping, talentless Gladstone Gander, riding the coattails of others toward success. He’s classically trained as a violinist, for starters. This string-centered specialty is evident on all of Blue Film’s tracks. Though their iridescence comes from the supporting electronica loops and themes, their effervescence explodes from those hints of his classical training. Staccato strings rise from empty spaces that turn the tracks into something complex and folded over, like a kind of theoretical physics model. {Read More}

Lost In the Trees approached their third album with a specific mission: To capture something less morose and somber than their second album, A Church that Fits Our Needs — an aural cathedral built for frontman Ari Picker’s mother, who committed suicide. They went into a more sparse, electronic direction, and even pared down their personnel from six to four. It’s a significant shift in the band’s direction, yet similar concepts to those on A Church reverberate throughout Past Life.

Narrators crumble into flames in explosive, emotional moments; death is a staircase meant to be climbed; angels speak; eyes house birds that flutter out in gestures of love; and still more angels float to and fro like some kind of stained glass window come to life in brilliant sunbursts. And those are just the lyrics. {Read More}