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An open letter to Foals re Holy Fire

Dear Foals,What are you doing? You used to have so much potential. When Antidotes was released in 2008, you were regarded as Battles for the pop listener! What a compliment! Your plinky guitar lines, math-rock ...

Foxygen's We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic

Sam France's voice has a hint of femininity to it as he introduces us to "In the Darkness," the gateway track to Foxygen’s second album. The L.A. indie-pop duo could have gone the campy route ...

Light Up Gold, by Parquet Courts

Parquet Courts' Light Up Gold is all sorts of what indie-rock should be heading toward in 2013 — clever lyrics, catchy song craft, infectious hooks, and an irresistible, giddy feel. It's like a stoner trapped ...

My Bloody Valentine's mbv

Mark February 2, 2013, on your calendars as “the day My Bloody Valentine broke the internet.” Why? Because on that day the band released mbv, the follow-up to a perfect album: 1991's Loveless. Twenty-two years ...

Foolish Blood by Two Hours Traffic

It’s embarrassing to admit I’ve never heard of a band that’s been around since 2002 — which convinces me its winsome sound transcends “noteworthy,” demanding “essential” status — unless that sound is so good that ...

Donald Fagen's Sunken Condos

This is Donald Fagen's first album in six years and, no, it's not about condo owners underwater on their mortgages. It is another Steely Dan (minus Walter Becker) easy-listening mix of smooth jazz shot through ...

Allez Allez say Night Marchers

Swami John Reis and the Night Marchers sat on this set for more than two years. Reis posts that it’s because he wanted each vinyl pressing hand-stamped. The only living human who does this, apparently, ...

Lost Animal's Ex Tropical

A synth player who leaves a popular Aussie band, St Helens, to explore the possibilities of himself with his machines? Sounds like a fairly risky set-up. But the short-lived indie band’s ex-songwriter/singer/guitarist/keyboardist has crafted a ...

Lonerism, by Tame Impala

Lonerism is the second outing for the brainchild of Perth’s Kevin Parker, for it is he who composes, produces, sings, and plays (almost) everything on Tame Impala records. He’s even responsible for the sleeve photography. ...

A Thing Called Divine Fits

A Thing Called Divine Fits could also be called a thing that Britt Daniel (Spoon) and Daniel Boeckner (Wolf Parade) came up with during downtime from their full-time bands. A Thing Called Divine Fits could ...

Mike Gao's Beta World Peace

Elaborating on textures from his 2011 debut, Sun Shadows, Beta World Peace sees a continuation of Mike Gao’s signature lurching bass lines, asymmetrical percussion, and glowing synth leads, orchestrated, in part, by his brainchild, Polyplayground ...

John Cale's Shifty Adventures in Nookie Wood

John Cale is not psychic! (Unless he is.) The man couldn’t have predicted Steve Albini’s second-motioning those mundane haters of Cher’s “Believe”; but he intuited that tipping point where the hip(sters) went (reflexively) bleech at ...

Battle Born, by the Killers

Nevada's finest are back in action with guns blazing. After nearly four years, the Las Vegas-based alt-rock band the Killers released their fourth studio effort, Battle Born. After the band's previous release, Day & Age, ...

Scott Walker's Bish Bosch

Seventeen years ago I put on Scott Walker’s album Tilt for the first time; the real-life Phantom of the Opera began to sing as I watched a storm overtake a city center, from my picture ...

The Complete Columbia Albums Collection of Sarah Vaughan

I purchased After Hours, one of the four freshly minted CDs in the Complete Columbia Albums box, many years ago, on vinyl. Shouldn’t having the original — the cover of which is minutely replicated, as ...