With its heavy-duty distortion, weighty rhythms, and cynical lyrics, Tool is a heavy metal band for the ’90s. Rather like Metallica circa …And Justice for All, the sound is focused heavily on texture, with vocals and guitars layered one atop the other, and heart-pounding drums underlying everything. There’s not a whole lot of variety on Tool’s second full-length …
Rivers In The Wasteland is the follow up to their acclaimed album The Reckoning, which saw the band spend over two years on the road in support of a collection of anthemic rock that caught the attention of The New York Times, NPR, Entertainment Weekly and USA Today.”We’ve come through some rough moments and some amazing moments,” says …
2012 release from the Icelandic outfit formed by singer/guitarist Nanna Brynd¡s Hilmarsd¢ttir. Their rapid rise transpired in just one year. Nanna, who began as the acoustic act Songbird, recruited extra hands to bolster her sound for a solo show. She liked how her vocals commingled with guitarist/vocalist Ragnar “Raggi” _¢rhallsson’s, so they started writing songs together and in …
Lost On The River: The New Basement Tapes is a music event 47 years in the making. It’s an historic album project from five of music’s finest artists — Elvis Costello, Rhiannon Giddens (Carolina Chocolate Drops), Taylor Goldsmith (Dawes), Jim James (My Morning Jacket) and Marcus Mumford (Mumford & Sons) — in unique collaboration with a 26-year-old Bob …
Carrie & Lowell sounds like memory: it spans decades yet does not trade on pastiche or nostalgia. Stevens’s gauzy double-tracked vocals wash across the dashboard of long-finned, drop-top Americana, yet as we race towards the coast we are reminded that sunshine leads to shadow, for this is a landscape of terminal roads, unsteady bridges, traumatic video stores, and …
“Your stuff is so hard, they’re gonna think it’s rock ‘n’ roll,” a friend once told Dwight Yoakam. Twisting strains of Hank Williams, Elvis Presley, Merle Haggard, and Gram Parsons into a stripped-down sound wholly his own, Yoakam is one of music’s true mavericks, and his body of work is one of the most innovative in all of …
CD features all the Culture Club hits on a single disc. The tracklisting includes, ‘Do You Really Want To Hurt Me?’, ‘Time (Clock Of The Heart)’, ‘I’ll Tumble For Ya’, ‘Church Of The Poison Mind’, ‘Karma Chameleon’, ‘Victims’ and much more. Virgin. 2005. …
Arguably their finest album, this follow-up to Opiate showcases Tool at their best, assisted by clean, crisp production, without the muddiness of Aenima. Edgy guitar riffs are complemented by spitting, heavy bass, especially on “Sober” and “Crawl Away”. Lyrically, Tool are at their vitriolic best, targeting religious hypocrisy (“Intolerance,” “Sober”; always a popular theme), the loss of innocence …
Having earned widespread acclaim with their 2009 debut album, Aim & Ignite, fun. decided to raise the stakes with this album, their first on Fueled By Ramen, by teaming with noted producer Jeff Bhasker (Kanye West, Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, Beyonce, Drake).The first single from Some Nights, “We Are Young (Feat. Janelle Monáe),” has generated quite a buzz, hitting …
Sometimes stars emerge. Sometimes stars are thrust upon us. And sometimes stars simply slip into the atmosphere as if propelled by something otherworldly. It is into this last category that the astonishing presence, voice, look and feel of Lana Del Rey falls. Musical stardom is not an option with Ms. Del Rey. It is her vocation. She calls …