Tag Archives: cd review

The Black Keys – “Brothers” [CD Review]

Review: Natalie Salvo
This is a record review about The Black Keys. But you already knew that didn’t you? So while we’re giving you ‘helpful’ but unnecessary statements, “Brothers” is the sixth studio album from the Ohio-based blues-rock duo.

The pair has been rather busy as of late with guitarist, Dan Auerbach dropping a solo album while Patrick Carney produced the aptly titled side project, Drummer. The boys then collaborated with a bunch of rappers for the hip-hop record, Blakroc.
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RocketSmiths – “Underground” : CD Review

Review: Lana Harris

  Underground is the new single for Rocketsmiths, a Brisbane based five piece that have been releasing EPs since 2006. With metaphors of the band’s sound leaning precariously towards the more raucous end of rock descriptors (carnie, rockabilly and carnivalesque among them), ‘Underground’ draws on short, punchy riffs and restrained energy to deliver a catchy first single.

The track begins with drumbeats tumbling from the silence and quickly ramps up into a tune that would fit right in with those on The White Stripes’ Elephant record.

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CD Review: Blood Red Shoes – “Fire Like This”

Review by: Victoria Nugent

  The latest offering from Brighton band Blood Red Shoes could be given the label of garage rock for a new generation. The duo’s second album, “Fire Like This”, is largely influenced by 90s grunge, and showcases some impressively gritty, heavy sounds, coupled with poppy lyrics and varied vocals. Though some may argue the tracks sound slightly generic, there’s no denying that Blood Red Shoes have their own distinct pattern that works for them.

The two piece band is made up of Steven Ansell and Laura-Mary Carter and formed in 2004 after their previous bands Lady Muck and Cat on Form split up. Taking their name

from a story about Ginger Rogers’ blood stained dancing shoes, the pair released their first album Box of Secrets in 2008, which, like Fire Like This , was co-produced with Mike Crossey. Continue reading CD Review: Blood Red Shoes – “Fire Like This” →

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CD Review: Escape The Fate – “This War Is Ours”

Review: Ben Hosking

  Escape the Fate (ETF) just doesn’t know what they want to be. The Las Vegas quartet plays a very American, largely accessible rock/metal blend for the most part. Their tunes switch back and forth between swaggering mid-tempo rockers, unconvincing ballads and even more surprising and bewildering blasts of deep growled passages over menacing riffage.

So just what is it that ETF are trying to achieve? Their vocalist Craig Mabbitt is reminiscent of most of the emasculated faux-metal front men currently in circulation.

You know the kind: a little nasal and still awaiting puberty. This means that they’ll never be fully accepted by the metal or hardcore scenes. Their big choruses and pop sensibilities have helped them to win over 20 million MySpace page views and 400,000 friends; yet they’re far beyond the realms of Australian radio. Continue reading CD Review: Escape The Fate – “This War Is Ours” →

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CD Review: Drawn From Bees – “Run Away”

Review: Victoria Nugent

Drawn From Bees   The latest offering from Brisbane art rock band Drawn from Bees is their new single Run Away, a melodious, Powderfinger-esque sample of their particular brand of indie rock.

Honest lyrics are teamed with a full-bodied acoustic sound to produce this mellow sounding single, hinting at more good things to come from the band’s upcoming album –

Fear Not the Footsteps of the Departed, to be released on May 21 2010. Continue reading CD Review: Drawn From Bees – “Run Away” →

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CD Review: Mapletons – “Origami Army”

Review: Victoria Nugent

Mapleton's   Mapleton’s Origami Army is an infectiously cheery blend of indie pop tunes that bring a smile to the face and make the listener want to sing along.

Mapletons started life as a duo with guitarist Derek Orr and keyboardist Kane Mazlin winning national songwriting awards. When Mazlin left to pursue other musical avenues, rather than abandoning Mapletons,

Orr rallied around the creative hub to create a new line up, with Anita Goldsworthy on keyboard and lead vocals, Carl Roosmale-Cocq on bass and programming duties, and Mitch Clark on drums. Continue reading CD Review: Mapletons – “Origami Army” →

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CD Review: An Horse – Rearrange Beds

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Review: Lauren Sherritt
rearrange beds coverRearrange Beds recalls in lurid, dreamlike detail memories of adolescent youth; of mistimed love, desperation and a need for just a little bit of control, and as the debut album for Australian two piece An Horse it acts as a solid showcase of the band’s notable talents. It’s honest, edgy and just a little bit off centre and will speak to anybody who remembers that baffling and awkward experience that is emerging into adulthood.
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CD Review: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – Beat The Devil’s Tattoo

Review: Lana Harris

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club   Black Rebel Motorcycle Club burst from the deep south of the USA and appeared on the music scene at around the same time as we were all worrying about the millennium bug. They were often touted as being ‘the band to take rock forward into the new millennium’ and with this expectation yapping at their heels they crossed the century border.

A decade on, BRMC are still making rock records, their most recent offering entitled Beat the Devil’s Tattoo. The band’s sound has since acquired other labels and modifiers including garage rock,

swamp rock, blues, country, indie pop and psych-garage. Elements of stoner rock appear in Beat The Devil’s Tattoo too, the characteristic fuzzy guitars and drawling lyrics of the genre weaved with a 70’s rock vibe. Nowhere is this more prevalent than on tracks ‘War Machine’ and ‘Aya’, droning slow burners bloated with distorted guitars that alternatively smoulder and blister. Continue reading CD Review: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – Beat The Devil’s Tattoo →

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CD Review: The Medics – This Boat We Call Love

Review: Lana Harris

The Medics   Thinking about Cairns, music is rarely the first thing that comes to mind. And when the brain cells do get around to firing in the melodic direction, the image drawn most frequently is that of cover bands playing ‘Down Under’ to hopelessly intoxicated backpackers. So it’s good to know that there are original, independent muso’s inhabiting the tourist Mecca, artists who can battle the salty humidity and lure of cheap pink drinks to produce a unique contribution to the Australian music scene.

The artists in question are known as The Medics, a four-piece emotive indie outfit with an arrangement of electric and

acoustic guitars, bass, keyboards, percussion and vocals. Their contribution is their second EP This Boat We Call Love. Continue reading CD Review: The Medics – This Boat We Call Love →

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CD Review: John Butler Trio – April Uprising

Review: Lana Harris

John Butler Trio - photo credit Polly Armstrong
John Butler Trio – Click here for John Butler Trio at iTunes		   John Butler and his newly revised trio (bringing Nicky Bomba to drums/ percussion and Byron Luiters to bass) have made every effort to make April Uprising an accessible folk rock record. Single ‘One Way Road’ was available for free download from several media outlets last year, on top of being the summer promo track on a certain digital sports channel, which guaranteed the single reached new ears. The Trio have also value added the LP by including a poster, environmentally friendly sized lyrics booklet and free trucker’s hat to those who buy the physical CD rather than download.

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CD Review: Carry Nation – Like a River Does

Review: Victoria Nugent

Carry Nation   Brisbane solo artist Carry Nation’s debut album Like A River Does is the perfect soundtrack for lazy summer days spent in contemplation, with its rich, full sound and intimate lyrics. Built around the foundation of the voice and guitar of Brisbane songwriter Jessie Warren, the recording sees her joined by bass, string and percussion players, with their music making the ideal accompaniment for Warren’s strong and honest vocals.

Warren began playing guitar at sixteen, writing her first song at seventeen, and playing her first show at the Verve Cafe at eighteen.

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CD Review: Rotting Christ – ‘AEALO’

Review: Ben Hosking

Rotting CHRIST AEALO
Rotting Christ – Buy: Rotting Christ at iTunes		   Rotting Christ is, for the uninitiated, a very strange beast upon first listen. Credited as being one of the progenitors of the second wave of Black Metal (BM) at the dawn of the 1990s, the band has amassed a sizeable and remarkable body of work spanning some 11 releases.

What sets Rotting Christ apart from their contemporaries is their ability to seamlessly inject their Greek heritage into the music. This is done largely within the accepted construct of the BM rule book and without a hint of cliché or pastiche.

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CD Review: The Dillinger Escape Plan – ‘Option Paralysis’

Review: Ben Hosking
Dillinger
The last few years have been pretty turbulent for The Dillinger Escape Plan. While their records and their live performances have always been violent musical explosions of fury, the latter usually quite unpredictable in nature, it did seem at one point that the band ran the risk of becoming victims of their own chaos. As front man Greg Puciato recently put it, the band was engulfed in “a vicious tornado of animosity” that led to the departure of drummer and co-founder Chris Pennie.

As history sits, their last album Ire Works was completed and toured with the help of Gil Sharone of avant garde group Stolen Babies. However, this proved only a temporary solution, with Sharone leaving the group at the end of 2008.

Certainly, Dillinger is not a band known for their stable line-up, with guitarist Ben Weinman the lone original member. Regardless, the group searched for permanent replacement through 2009 – no easy task considering the relentlessly brutal barrage of erratic blast beats that permeate most of their music. What they found was 25-year-old Billy Rymer.
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EP Review: Tara Simmons – All You Can

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Review: Lana Harris

Tara Simmons   There are very few musicians about today who can craft such an accurate visual portrait of their music as Tara Simmons has done with her new EP, All You Can. The cover depicts a childish collection of objects – colourful magnetic letters, a doll with a crocheted dress, plastic representations of party foods, but on closer inspection… there are dismembered doll limbs in display jars on the wall, an unconscious hamster lying inert on the worn table. The tainted innocence portrayed fits Tara’s music on All You Can all too well. Track three, ‘Rosemary’ begins as a gentle folky song before swelling to a dirge like chorus and revealing itself lyrically as the deconstruction of a discourteous woman. Track one, ‘The Fundamentalist’, has reverential overtones, with its choral back up vocals and organ chords, but I wonder if Tara is playing with her

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CD Review: Dan Parsons – Run With Me

Dan Parsons – Run With Me
Review by: Lana Harris

Dan Parsons
Available at Dan Parsons 		   It’s a little known fact that record companies are the perpetuators of the idea that only by hearing a song can you get it out of your head – which conveniently places it in one thousand other people’s minds when you request it on the radio. Eventually people buy it for an always accessible cure, and thus the song’s place on the charts is secured.

‘Cut Off’, the B side track to ‘Run with Me’, is a song that gets stuck in your mind.

Verses open on drums and vocals, the guitars follow a few bars later, and soon enough the tempo has built up to the four word chorus. Tambourine and piano chords add more interest to the usual instruments that dominate guitar based singles. ‘Cut Off’ could be a stand alone single, as could ‘We Were so Young’, a track which screams ‘our song’ for girls with floral dresses and their childhood sweethearts. The B sides’ quality suggests that when the album is released, it will be an impressive offering.
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