Slipped Discs - Discs You May Have Missed by John Noyd

Laswell, Greg

Landline
Record Label: Vanguard
Review published: March 2012

Moving cross-country and recording in an isolated church in Maine, Laswell’s soul-searching concerns blend soaring gorgeous rejoicing and candid candied choruses into complicated relations, casual kiss-offs and boldly open-hearted charges. Forthright emotional songs enhanced by co-ed cameos, muscular melodies and perceptive connections, “Landline,” redesigns romantic advances while sumptuous production camouflages terse wordplay conveying bittersweet bravado, therapeutic subterfuge and self-reliant defiance.

Votes: 1

Lightships

Electric Cables
Record Label: Domino
Review published: March 2012

A mellow masterpiece of poignant jangle, Teenage Fanclub’s Gerald Love delivers a transcendent stew of effervescent restlessness and sparkling tenderness, painting embraceable odes over buzzing, cuddly, twang-filled tranquility. An immaculate pageant of meticulous pop-rock lullabies bathed in cooing beauty, “Cables,” cradles velvety synths, squirming drums and fidgety guitars in sinfully winsome innocence, sun-soaked hope skimming daydreaming secrets and soft-spoken smiles.

Votes: 0

Lindstrom

Six Cups of Rebel
Record Label: Smalltown supersound
Review published: January 2012

Cyber-slick misfits click in clock-boxing fits of spiraling slingshots, bottomless vertigo and chattering static, Lindstrom’s measured textures settle restlessly, zapping synapses while evaporating pneumatic Acid House, toasted Detroit cronk and pole-dancing funk. Mechanized mayhem outfitted in cosmic electronics, “Rebel,” mounts dry-ice avalanches smothered in jigsaw awesomeness and rollercoaster sensuality, tubular grooves built from viscous ricochets, space-age mirror-balls refracting jet-propelled raves. 

Votes: 0

Los Campesinos!

Hello Sadness
Record Label: Arts & Crafts
Review published: November 2011

Licking delicious wounds, consuming outmoded empires, “Sadness,” greets everyday ennui with frank angst and heart-wrenching contempt lined in retreaded memories, invective conjecture and randy candor. Gawky jockeys chasing traceless impatience, LC!’s sharp, carping lyrics explode into wiry brain-knots, mating anxious drums and twitchy indie-rock to hopeful odes nursing regressed regrets, slicing open societal secrets through flag-waving saviors and pop-singing trail-blazers.

Votes: 0

Loom, The

Teeth
Record Label: Crossbill Records
Review published: October 2011

Bravely wavering between well-heeled alt-rock squalor and rustic murder-ballad pageantry, “Teeth,” embraces embroidered warrior voyages. Swooning in musical courtship, admonished sonics stir sea-worthy furies for elegantly tweaked chamber-folk fevers. The Loom’s hushed rustler’s rhetoric and wild-eyed folk-revival fosters sprawling banjo to brass passages, rip-roaring chorales built from war-torn madrigals reaping bonfire finales. The Brooklyn quintet plays UW’s Rathskellar November 12th.

Votes: 0