Slipped Discs October 2010
Discs You May Have Missed
by John Noyd
Maynard James Keenan's Blood Into Wine
Initial Thoughts
No two ways about it - autumn’s musical titles are out for blood. From extra-textured San Diego doom-folk duo THE BLACK HEART PROCESSION’s limited edition mini-album “Blood Bunny/Black Rabbit,” to Puscifer front-man MAYNARD JAMES KEENAN’s country-blues grind-rock soundtrack of his Arizona wine-making documentary, “Blood into Wine,” Roctober turns Clotober. Add CARL WILSON’s reissued gem, “Youngblood,” and WINTER GLOVES’ shifty electro-funky alt-rock valentine, “All Red,” and good vibrations are circulating everywhere.
Disc Reviews
Blood Red Shoes - Fire Like This
Blood Red Shoes
Album title: Fire Like This
Record Label: V2
Taking no prisoners, “Fire,” ignites a hailstorm of monster tremolo, big-screen screams and explosive grooves. Circling like muscled vultures, Shoes’ shiny goose-step rock assaults with two-fisted rivers of hard-nosed prose and sizzling riff missiles. Blasting past unrepentant petulance, “Fire,” builds tense acrylic retaliations, guarded shards accosting blockbuster structures, flaunting dive-bombing stomps and stoked locomotives. BRS crash Chicago’s Subterranean October 29th.
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Blood Red Shoes online:
• Website • Facebook • Wiki
Nobunny - First Blood
Nobunny
Album title: First Blood
Record Label: Goner Records
Psycho-jingle slapstick wrapped in lo-fi stoner nostalgia, “First,” works self-mocking mirth, twisting feel-good formulas into tasty craziness. Bubblegum decadence laced with rockabilly’s cheerful sneers, surf’s feckless recklessness and punk’s primitive deliverance, intrepid renegade Nobunny’s whacked attacks skip merrily around contagious outrageousness, flipping the bird via Merseybeat raves, roughed-up New Wave and rabid fifties romps for raucously lop-sided sock-hop party rock.
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Nobunny online:
• Website • Facebook • Wiki
• Download First Blood from Amazon
• Purchase First Blood on Amazon
Meridene - Something like Blood
Meridene
Album title: Something like Blood
Record Label: Amble Doown Records
Wise asides and quick quips happily carry percolating electric piano, bipolar guitar, and rock-solid bass and drums; like shock absorbers on a bumpy road, “Something,” comforts contemplative cravings in cryptic hipster’s whisperings told in simmering conviction. Convincingly syncing thoughtful despondency in a stew of swinging rhythms, Eau Claire’s Meridene attain rare pop honesty, accurately capturing passing moods through descriptive prescriptions.
(2791) Page Views
Meridene online:
• Website • Facebook
• Download Something like Blood from Amazon
• Purchase Something like Blood on Amazon
Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson - Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson
Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson
Album title: Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson
Record Label: Ghostlight
Joyfully boisterous political burlesque, “BBAJ,” spin power-mongering parables into fame-driven morals and energetic allegories. Charismatically arrogant characters burst into effervescent bravado as gorgeous hoi polloi choruses orchestrated by rockin’ rabble rousers provide spot lit soliloquies inside rock-star bluster and feisty, foul-mouthed fanfares squeezed between bittersweet pop-rock pleads. Smart, sharp and sarcastic, “BBAJ,” deliver amusing historical buffoonery alongside theatrically hijacked fact.
(3034) Page Views
Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson online:
• Website • Facebook • Wiki
• Download Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson from Amazon
• Purchase Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson on Amazon
Dryft - Ventricle
Dryft
Album title: Ventricle
Record Label: n5MD
Cosmic concerts imprisoning hissing precision, Dryft’s murmuring currents and logical dawns sculpt cyber-swaddled sun-bursts from intergalactic grinds, Laboring into wakefulness under glittering alien skies, “Ventricle,” unfolds slowly, vacuum-packed and industrial. Eclipsed, frisked and whisked past paranormal storms of zero gravity ambience, Dryft’s subtle shifts and soft landings nestle against cloaked cacophony and trippy mysteries, thawed and refrozen; space-age rage rewired.
(3048) Page Views
Dryft online:
• Website • Facebook • Wiki
• Download Ventricle from Amazon
• Purchase Ventricle on Amazon
The Posies - Blood/Candy
The Posies
Album title: Blood/Candy
Record Label: Rykodisc
Renowned perpetrators of American pop irony, the Posies’ craftily immaculate power-pop pageantry returns, leveling its majestic assessments over clever metaphors, creating crackling candy-coated kiss-offs while deflating egos in slick wit. From cordial to incorrigible, from guilty-pleasured hooks to shark-jumping arrangements, “B/C” harbors hindsight harmonies between gleefully deviant toe-tappers. Double-billed with Brendan Benson, the Posies play Milwaukee’s Turner Hall November 5th
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The Posies online:
• Website • Facebook • Wiki
• Purchase Blood/Candy on Amazon
Final Thoughts
October’s ominous titles sponsor congenial jubilations. Fear not eloquent chamber-folk darlings DARK DARK DARK’s waltzing Balkan blues balladry, “Wild Go,” Travis front-man FRAN HEALY’s solo debut, the tenderly catchy, heart on a sleeve, “WreckOrder,” Canadian alt-pop connoisseurs SMALL SINS’ delectably suave and coolly subversive, “Pot Calls Kettle Black,” or post-modern Kasbah mix-masters BEATS ANTIQUES’ gypsy-snipped and Egyptian-whipped electronica, “Blind Threshold.” Just to confuse matters, unravel one-man-band UNKNOWN COMPONENT’s, full-throttled folk-rock fables, “The Infinite Definitive,” and cathartic artist THREE MILE PILOT’s throbbing rock concoction, “The Inevitable Past Is The Future Forgotten.”