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Dancing Echoes / Dead Sounds
Equal Vision (2004)

A lot of albums are released during the course of a year. Hell, even if you rule out all the albums that you know you have no interest in at all, there will still be some that you just don't get around to fully checking out until much after the fact. So while everyone else is focusing on the next … Read more

The Pax Cecilia

Nouveau
Independent (2004)

So you're in a rock band and you already look different than other bands with your crazy hair and fingernail polish, but you want to sound different. So you add a keyboard to your band. Fucktacular, bro! In addition to adding a new instrument to a band, another option that The Pax Cecilia takes with Nouveau is to synthesize previously … Read more

The Loved Ones

The Loved Ones
Jade Tree (2005)

Memories of listening to Lifetime and hanging out with the crew every day of the week, skating, partying, or what have you, will always be there for me. It was undoubtedly some of the best times of my life. So when I heard about The Loved Ones and their comparisons to Lifetime, I was very intrigued. I hadn't had such … Read more

Bright Eyes

I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning
Saddle Creek (2005)

The morning is generally associated with hope and rebirth. Leave it up to sad-eyed pessimist Conor Oberst to reverse this symbol in I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning . Now the morning reveals all the clandestine secrets that lurk in the dark, all the secrets forgotten from a drunken night of destruction bask and glimmer in the sunlight. It brings consequences … Read more

LCD Soundsystem

LCD Soundsystem
DFA (2005)

I have too much love for James Murphy, the man behind LCD Soundsystem. This guy sits atop a throne of excellence, which sits atop a black mountain of cracked vinyl, which sits atop the sweaty corpses of the over-danced. You'd think that being named one of the coolest people on the planet would render a man intolerably arrogant - but … Read more

...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead

Worlds Apart
Interscope (2005)

Vocalist Conrad Keely poses a question on the album's title track; "What's the future of Rock-n-Roll?" A rhetorical question? Perhaps, but he chooses to answers anyway, even if it is sarcastically: "Does it matter?" To answer his question, yes, it does. For if the future is filled with annoying indie/pop acts like Franz Ferdinand and the revival of washed up … Read more

The Fiery Furnaces

Blueberry Boat
Sanctuary (2004)

Music as true art begs to be delved deeper into. Controversially classic albums such as Daydream Nation, Zen Arcade, and Kid A warrant very little before much time and myriad repeat listens. On first hearing, albums such as the aforementioned often appear completely impenetrable, inaccessible, and, in some cases, entirely unlistenable; nothing exists to grab the listener instantaneously by the … Read more

Let it Die

Stick to Your Guns
Spook City (2004)

The city of Detroit has a bad reputation on the streets of, well, the entire United States. It's known as a dirty, crime-ridden city full of despair and wretched individuals. While I am sure there is some truth to this, it is likely nothing more than a generalization blown way out of proportion. Nevertheless, the city has spawned some fairly … Read more

The Arcade Fire

Funeral
Merge (2004)

Hating to love something is a complicated and frustrating emotion. When it comes to music, I prefer one of the following: to love an album unconditionally and make it a part of my life, despise it with a scorching passion, or just entirely forget about it altogether. Conflicting emotions and any sort of middle ground or grey area regarding an … Read more

We Versus The Shark

Ruin Everything!
Hello Sir (2005)

Sharks are awesome. They have big teeth, they've been around since the dinosaurs, and they'll eat anything. Sharks are awesome. We Versus The Shark are pretty cool, too. Their music is razor-sharp and jagged, not unlike shark teeth. But they haven't been around quite as long, it seems. Ruin Everything! is their debut effort. (Pfft. Mick Jagger rocked out with … Read more

Kaada & Patton

Romances
Ipecac (2004)

By now everyone is familiar with "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon," that fun movie trivia game that is ever-so-often used as a conversation stimulator. Well I plan to create a variation of the game for the music industry, "Six Degrees of Mike Patton." Why? Simple, Patton has ties with notable artists in nearly every genre of music: metal, hip hop, … Read more

Instilled

Unfinished Business
State of Mind (2004)

The city of Atlanta is known for its output of southern fried rap and hip hop MC's like Outkast, Ludacris, and Jermaine Dupri. But there is more to the city than just inane rhymes and crunk beats. Not unlike hip hop in the 80's, Instilled are ready to break out of the shadow of modern music and take the world … Read more

Food For Animals

Scavengers
Muckamuck (2004)

*Sound of Scavengers being slipped into a CD player* "Holy crap! What am I listening to?" "Is this Vast Aire fronting Wolf Eyes?" "Is this the sound of my imminent doom via an aural assault so intense my face is about to explode?" "Holy crap! What am I listening to?" All valiant guesses, friend of friends, but let me give … Read more

Legs Up / My War

Split
State of Mind (2004)

Split releases are a breed that can be difficult to review. Do I review each band's portion separately, or do I give the entire release one score? It's a tough call, but I think you have to treat each split album differently. This time around, mostly for Legs Up sake, I am going to review these two bands apart from … Read more

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