If you’re really good or really lucky (coughKanyeWestcough), you can get both at once. Rocky Business’ seven-song EP, “A Rebel’s Roar,” skews toward the art, with a few pit stops in the nonsense. I mention it because the rap/pop duo is really good at club-thumpin’ nonsense when it wants to be. Non-EP single “Kim Kardashian” […]
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Steven Boone — Rockabye Baby!: Lullaby Renditions of The Flaming Lips
New to the former is Steven Boone’s “Lullaby Renditions of the Flaming Lips.” It is just that: instrumental covers of the Lips catalogue, but played largely on a calming, tinkling vibraphone, and slowed to a soothing pace that’ll relax even those of us who have mastered the art of not peeing our pants. As someone […]
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Lenka — Two
The Australian pop ingénue caught my ear with “Roll with the Punches,” a tune that would be at home having a tea party with She and Him, Ingrid Michaelson and Regina Spektor. The plucky vocal stylings of Spektor meets the faux vintage sound of She and Him while the exuberant arrangements of Michaelson cap the […]
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All Tiny Creatures — Harbors
It needs a name, but op-prog seems wrong. Oprog? Oprock? Op rock? I have no idea. If bands keep coming out like Delicate Steve, Adebisi Shank and now All Tiny Creatures, I’ll have to distill this idea into one name. But for now, it’s enough for you to know that All Tiny Creatures’ “Harbors” splits […]
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Mansions — Dig Up the Dead
Mansions’ main man Christopher Browder decided to make a rock album called “Dig Up the Dead.” The best thing Browder could have done was make an acoustic album of the same songs called “Dig Up the Dead.” I’m not just being petulant. His last release, “Best of the Bees,” was a collection of cast-off tracks […]
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Emily Arin — Patch of Land
But Emily Arin’s “Patch of Land” bursts through those categories and creates a mesmerizing album that can’t be pinned down. Her instrument is the acoustic guitar, and she sings in a haunting tone that falls just south of soprano. Her songs incorporate modern singer/songwriter, folk, ‘50s pop, country, waltzes and more. The whole album is […]
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Smith Westerns — Dye It Blonde
The new wave of “it” bands remember good songs and have decided to write some. Like Brits Yuck and New Yorker Luke Rathborne, the Chicagoans in Smith Westerns have put their heads together to make solid guitar rock tunes on “Dye It Blonde.” Nothing new under the sun, for real. But the reason that Smith […]
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Jazzed up
Those are two of the strongest stereotypes local jazz musicians fight when trying to find ears for their increasingly diverse offerings. With Kenny G the farthest thing from their minds, artists are creating a vital, progressive jazz scene in bars, concert halls and festivals. But it’s still a struggle. “It’s not America’s most popular music […]
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Flock rock
In the midst of winter, when most bands hole up and hibernate, Oklahoma City’s The Wurly Birds bundled up, packed their instruments and made their way to the Paseo to play for the passersby. They plunked down a guitar case to hold any tips the modest crowds might be willing to donate and played for […]
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The kids aren’t all right
One might wonder what sort of person is capable of coming up with a line like “Dookie in her panties / That ain’t Hershey’s whore / Nasty-ass slut trying to get on ‘Jersey Shore.’” Look no farther than the boys of Purple Mouth Bandits, a hip-hop collective born out of wine-sipping sessions in Moore less […]