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Our latest album reviews, featuring the records we've most enjoyed (or not) over the past few weeks.

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Browse our album reviews according to score: Highest (9.5/10 or more) or Lowest (2/10 or less)

Minus the Bear

Planet of Ice
Suicide Squeeze (2007)

Continuing on from 2005's Menos El Oso, Minus the Bear's Planet of Ice breaks away from the band's previous shtick of long song names and extended album titles. As the record name may suggest, this album is slightly colder and less forgiving than previous releases. To drag that analogy just one metaphor further, we can also hear a slightly more powerful feel to the band's layered sound, giving them the natural force and dominance of a glacier. Planet of Ice is the band's first record without former keyboard player Matt Bayles, who departed to focus on his production. Electronics and keys are now handled by former engineer Alex Rose, who makes his presence here felt particularly in closing track "Lotus" with its shimmering synth middle section. At almost nine minutes this track far outstrips previous efforts in length, almost veering into the intimidating world of progressive rock. But I'm getting ahead of myself. We start off with some stuttering sounds that could be Dave Knudson's trademark looped guitar samples, before the album begins with some familiar Minus the Bear rhythms. "Ice Monster" gives us Jake Snider's typical lyrical offerings about lost love and storybook journeys, before some ticking synths swirl … Read more

Multiple Authors

Minus the Bear

Planet of Ice
Suicide Squeeze (2007)

Here's where I am: I'm standing on a beach, four time zones away from "home." It's March, but here it … Read more

Nekromantix

Life is a Grave and I Dig It!
Hellcat (2007)

Sometimes a joke can go too far. You know what I mean - like that puny kid at school who … Read more

Sleepytime Gorilla Museum

In Glorious Times
The End (2007)

If you've never seen Sleepytime Gorilla Museum live, do yourself the favor the next time they come to your town, … Read more

El Ten Eleven

Every Direction is North
Bar/None (2007)

Some would argue that post-rock has, in recent years, become overpopulated with carbon copies of Explosions in the Sky. Although … Read more

Jesu / Eluvium

Split
Temporary Residence/Hydra Head (2007)

Arriving home at approximately 5:30 PM EST, I walk up to my door to see the familiar Temporary Residence logo … Read more

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One from the archives

Laura Marling

Once I Was An Eagle
Virgin (2013)

The musical scene that was dubbed ‘nu-folk’ appeared quaint almost from its origins, perhaps due to the fact it will be forever associated with MOR stadium fillers Mumford and Sons or perhaps because the concept of folk as ‘new’ seems paradoxical in nature. Indeed, of the artists that have emerged from it and are still talked about, the tag no longer fits with ease, if at all. For Laura Marling, the process of escape became truly evident on previous record A Creature I Don’t Know whilst with this latest album, it has become all too literal. In a Guardian article earlier this year, Marling discussed her decision to re-locate from London to Los Angeles with the intimation that her environment had become “stagnant” and that there was a need to … Read more

More album reviews

Death Before Dishonor

Count Me In
Bridge Nine (2007)

Boston-based and Boston-proud, Death Before Dishonor has been churning out bruising hardcore since they first hit the scene with True Till Death. Their debut EP hit with very much the same style of breakdown heavy metallic hardcore that they drew their namesake from. Five years later, the band continues to deliver the hits with Count Me In, their debut full-length. … Read more

Signs of Hope

First and Foremost
Detonate (2007)

It wasn't more than twenty-four hours from the time that I started typing up this review that I was having a conversation with a friend of mine in the basement bathroom of Cheapo Records about the '88 styled hardcore resurgence that happened, for the most part, in Boston in the last part of the 20th century. He commented on how, … Read more

Kill Your Idols

Something Started Here
Get Outta Town / Lifeline (2007)

Kill Your Idols were always one of those bands to me. I never considered myself a fan of their music, maybe having a track or two on various compilations, but I would never outwardly say "they suck" or some similar criticism. My indifference to the band wasn't total either. I can recount seeing them four or five times, almost always … Read more

Blitzen Trapper

Wild Mountain Nation
LidKerCow Ltd. (2007)

When I'm on a road trip, I get this undeniable urge to listen to All-American music. We're talking CCR and we're talking Skynyrd and Tom Petty, and we're talking Violent Femmes and Pavement and Modest Mouse. Something about that western scenery. Just like you can hear the British in an Ozzy or Kinks' record, you can hear the American in … Read more

Black Dice

Roll Up / Drool
Paw Tracks (2007)

Black Dice are ridiculous; they have the spottiest and most transformative of musical histories even when compared the most dysfunctional bands. After ten years and numerous experimentations in sound, the band is somehow still cooking up and destroying music, and with plenty of gusto to boot. The first of two songs is "Roll Up," and it starts the record off … Read more

Last of the Believers

Paper Ships Under a Burning Bridge
Independent (2007)

Paper Ships Under a Burning Bridge is the debut offering from Last of the Believers, a new project spearheaded by former members of the extremely underrated Reach the Sky, as well as Ignite and Spark of Life. The music that Last of the Believers offers on this, a five-song EP, combines the members past experience into one impressive debut. Paper … Read more

Rocky Votolato

The Brag and Cuss
Barsuk (2007)

Rocky Votolato has been a busy man of late. He released last year's Makers to wide acclaim and only just recently re-issued A Brief History with his long time collaborators at Second Nature recordings. This brings us to his latest musical foray. The Brag and Cuss is Votolato's sixth album since he began releasing his solo material in 1999, and … Read more

Lymbyc Systym

Love Your Abuser
Mush (2007)

The limbic system controls a fairly large part of the human brain. It helps us get aroused, remembers important facts, and regulates the sleep cycle, among other cerebral functions. Exchange a few vowels and you end up with Lymbyc Systym. But what could this subtle transformation mean? The Bell brothers of Arizona are Lymbyc Systym; one deals with the keyboards, … Read more

Cruel Hand

Without a Pulse
6131 (2007)

It's time to play the ex-member/members of game again. This time we have members and former members of the Maine hardcore unit, Outbreak. If I'm not mistaken Cruel Hand is actually the same Outbreak lineup that gave us the You Make Us Sick EP, but with a different singer. So if you haven't guessed Cruel Hand does at times sounds … Read more

Loser Life

I Have Ghosts and I Have Ghosts
Magic Bullet (2007)

Loser Life comes from a place called Bakersfield, California, an area the band has numerously described as "the armpit of California." This is what Loser Life is influenced by, and the band's sound makes their pleasant description seem all too realistic. Loser Life is dirty, grimy, filthy, and fucking pissed off at their little hole in the world, and the … Read more

The End

Elementary
Relapse (2007)

For anyone unfamiliar, The End is a Canadian band that have established themselves as a math metal powerhouse, similar to a more controlled and brooding The Dillinger Escape Plan. Within Dividia and the Transfer Trachea EP were intense, frantic and at times almost impenetrable. Someone should have gotten to them earlier, because with three and a half years between albums, … Read more

200 Words Or Less

Sleep Terror

Probing Tranquility
Feeling Faint (2006)

Luke Jaeger is a one-man metal making machine; Sleep Terror is his solo project and musical outlet. Fifteen staggeringly technical tracks make up Probing Tranquility, but the album barely surpasses half an hour. I'm no metal aficionado, but I am an avid guitar player; however, it hardly takes a musician to sense the complexity of this release. Blast beats mesh … Read more

200 Words Or Less

Ceremony

Scared People
Bridge Nine (2007)

One of the better bands currently existing in hardcore returns with a new EP, their first release since signing to Bridge Nine Records. This time around Ceremony shows they've got more in their songwriting arsenal than just lightning fast demonstrations of hate a la Infest. Showing even more variance in writing than their last release, Scared People shows what promise … Read more

Fucked Up

Year of the Pig
Whats Your Rupture? (2007)

Fucked Up are on intimate terms with ambiguity. It's a rare virtue, since as a rule rock bands tend to seek the comfort of ham-fisted moralism or an apathy either hard-partying or self-pitying. But like Sylvia Plath circa Ariel or the earliest punk bands, Fucked Up stamp their works with an intimidating and sometimes uncomfortable symbolic resonance, leaving it to … Read more

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