Ittō play real basement hardcore, you know, as opposed to that fake stuff. This is their first album. Get to know this album and then check these spazzers out on the new 4-way dance coming out entitled The Sound of Young America. The split will include three other bands that aren't tied down to just being another "contemporary" hardcore or screamo band - Capacities, Innards, and Calculator.
Bird-influenced math rock from Ontario. An Ode to... is a follow-up to Dore Mear Beon's 2012 self-titled EP which included a very cool song that sampled the Richard Linklater film, Waking Life. Dore Mear Beon is definitely for fans of Time Columns, Enemies, Zefs Chasing Cara, The Bulletproof Tiger, as well as other one-person math rock acts.
Learned how Roman Numerals work again. Personally, I prefer all the X's.
Delos / Yusuke - Split (2013)
This is a sweet screamo/hardcore/emo violence split I've been holding on to featuring Delos from Bremen, Germany and Yusuke from Illinois, Untied States. Very scream-y, very messy.
Yusuke's side:
Delos's side:
It appears that both bands are either really into Louise Cyphre (Yusuke) or used to be Louise Cyphre (Delos).
Princess Reason is a lo-fi indie pop group from Echo Park, California. They sound like stuff you should play on cassette while you are in your room alone and not acting tough listening to tough people music. It's a real treat really. Fans of Coma Cinema, Spook Houses, Julia Brown, Pill Friends, and quite lo-fi will definitely get a kick out of this stuff if they aren't already.
Before 2013 ended, all I knew about Soda Bomb was that they have a cover of the King of the Hill theme song. Now it's 2014 and I still don't know much about these guys other than I went the whole year without checking to see if they had released anything new.. and they did. Good thing Broken World Media let me know, seeing as they released these guys mid-2013 release, The Future is Gonna Suck last October.
Soda Bomb play fuzzy garage punk rock. Bring back the Attitude Era thumbs up if you agree.
Dog Knights Productions presents a 25 song tribute to one of the most influential and essential bands in screamo, Orchid. Epilogue of a Car Crash, named after the chilling closer from Chaos Is Me, features 24 screamo/hardcore/punk whatever bands assembled from all over the world with the soul purpose of honoring the band that probably got them into this whole skramz mess.
The album includes some familiar names like: Full of Hell, For Want Of, Carrion Spring, Lizards Have Personalities, Foxes, Republic of Dreams, Innards, and Sed Non Saitata (twice!); along with some new names (to me) like: Coma Regalia, Voyage In Coma, Questionable Youth, Lord Snow, Itto, History of the Hawk, Todos Caerán, and many more!
Houston We Have A Problem was the first ("real") "screamo" band I ever encountered and even though I would begin listening to this 2006 release, 'Shipwreck' mostly for the edgy post rock crescendos and texture it featured, I would eventually, over time, come back to it for the way that they blended the vocals and screaming into such an emotional atmosphere. Sometimes screaming is just another instrument, sometimes it's a cry for help. Houston We Have A Problem successfully used both to their advantage. And by successfully, I mean pretty freakin' well.
Apart from manipulating the post rock to screamo, slow to choatic approach like that of City of Caterpillar and/or Men of Trees, Houston We Have A Problem (especially on 'Shipwreck') used extensive samples (obviously a big interest of mine) that open the songs up like story books and accent their instrumental work that overlaps the words. And as the album name as well as the song titles "Poseidon, Angered", "Titanic, The First Victim", "Calm Seas Become the Squall", or "Valdez, Drunk Driving is Punishable on Water Also" suggest, this is a maritime themed (and maybe conceptive) release. That may not be as cool to you as it is to me but I live for this kind of stuff. It's in my blood. The conversations and words that were sampled in this album, self-released by the way, don't seem like they are sea themed as the rest of the album tends to lead you on about, but are actually mostly from a movie called, 'The Legend of 1900' that not only deals with life at sea but also the music of the time after World War II. I have yet to see this film but from what I know about it, it sounds right up my alley.
Also, one of the coolest parts about the screaming that goes on in this album is that it isn't just one guy screaming his brains out non-stop, but the whole band, and with the whole band on vocal duties, it makes for quite the listen. Most notably due to all the different shrills and yelps that each member of this four piece brought to this recording... a recording that surely has some of the most original yelling I have ever heard, hands down.
Houston We Have A Problem has since broken up, but not without releasing three self produced albums (The Sky Did Not Crack and the Stars Did Not Fall, Punk is Dead, and Shipwreck). After calling it quits, some members went on to form Who Goes There? and the others went on to form Perfect Future. If you're liking what you are hearing from HWHAP, I definitely suggest you go check those bands out as well. There's not a lot of ways to listen to them but hey, this is 2012, kid... you'll figure it out.
Similar acts/sounds: City of Caterpillar, Gospel, Circle Takes the Square, Envy, Who Goes There?, Perfect Future, Men As Trees/Locktender, I Create, The Caution Children, We Were Skeletons, Lizards Have Personalities, and other bands not named Houston We Have A Problem.
"Take a piano. Keys begin, keys end. You know there are 88 of them. Nobody can tell you any different. They are not infinite. You are infinite...
The Act of Estimating as Worth are a really splendid indie folk band from New York. The duel vocals of Zoe and Matt are very cute in a Good Luck sort of way and remind me of some kind of Kimya Dawson project like Moldy Peaches or Antsy Pantsy but with a frontman like Bill Callahan or David Berman. It's much more relaxed than Dawson overall though and, while songs like "My Left Thumb" and "Nickels and Dimes" are very cute, there is still a bit of a "hey this is just a song and I want to sing it without trying to 'awwww' you" type of attitude. If that makes any sense..
I guess cute wasn't a good adjective.
Among These Splintered Minds//Leaden Thoughts Sing Softly is due out on Cassette February 24th. You can get if for free at their bandcamp, however, if you do not have a cassette player or walkman anymore. You should probably get one of those if you want to be cool though...
I guess I'll diversify this Monday post a little more with one of my all time favorite bands, Why? Why? Why not?!
The indie rock band with a little pep in their step's classic, Elephant Eyelash from the year 2005 is right up there with Alopecia (for me at least and probably many others). The thing I love about Why? is that I can hear a track from them I haven't yet, went to hear again a minute later and then let it become my new favorite. Elephant Eyelash is a prime example of this. Where it lacks in standout tracks that Alopecia had like "Vowels Pt. 2" and "The Hollows", Elephant Eyelash lets you enjoy tracks like "Gemini (Birthday Song)" and "Fall Saddles" that while aren't super over produced become really lovable growers. Once you listen to the album you will want to go back and listen to it again. The standout track in Elephant Eyelash would have to go to "Rubber Traits". The dark horse; "Act Five". "Act Five" might be my favorite Why? track that'll probably never get the respect it will deserve. Especially with superb lyrics like "All the people who taught me card tricks are dying/I've been trying/To steal my grandfather's handsome from old photographs". That line gets me every time.
Damn, I actually had to listen to that song two times in a row right after mentioning it! So good.
Very similar to Old Stories but with a little more glock.
"Withered Life: Communal Rhythm", "Under the New Sun" and "Steps In Static Progression" definitely have to be standout tracks on this one. Listen to them all though!
Honestly, I forgot about this gem a friend of mine showed me last year. Some of that forgetfulness may have been due in part by the attention the last track had on me, which is a killer remix of The Tallest Man On Earth's "The Wild Hunt". The remix is called The Wild Grit and is introduced by a True Grit sample (the original I believe). But The Wild Grit is not the only thing being remixed or filled with fun and/or goofy samples. No, actually that's what this albums all about! Every track is a remix, or sample really, of an indie band's work. And though I may have been stuck on how cool it was to see a indie folk star like The Tallest Man On Earth being used in a super bouncy and moving number, the whole album has great examples of what can be done with a normal old indie rock n roll track in a bedroom dance and hip-hop-y format! Even though I'm not a big fan of bands like The Decembrists, Local Natives, Kings of Convenience, and Little Joy, the tracks that their work represents in the album is really interesting and gives them life (not to say that they don't have life by themselves but... LEANN GRIMES makes 'em sound.. fun!).
I don't wanna give anything else away though! Some stuff is just meant to be listened to and not picked apart. I will say that The Wild Grit has always been my favorite track, I'm also now a huge fan of Keep Me In Grimes, Memory Noise, Got To Grime and Cats & Dogs in Idaho, I'm also a big fan of classic Disney movies redone in 3D and long walks on the beach but none of that matters... All the track should be listened to!
Loma Prieta are a heavy hitting screamo and emotionally violent sounding hardcore rock band from San Fran that just put out a new album earlier this month. It sounds really harsh and noisy! And angry!
Did you know Loma Prieta are made up of some members from Punch, Beau Navire, Sailboats, and us, haunted bodies, and Archeopteryx? Did you also know that I only knew that because it says it on their Last.fm... except I put the bands in order of how much I know them?
Old Gray are an emo revival, spoken word, talk to yell bands that come from New Hampshire. I don't know how many of those bands there are down there but I think it's pretty cool. Maybe they'll crawl up to Maine sometime. Maybe they already have... and brought back a deer head for there 2011 release, Do I Dare Disturb The Universe, artwork.
Do I Dare Disturb Universe may only feature 4 tracks but it is full off goodies that will fill you up. They are satisfied with what it sounds like and "put all they had into it". Plus the last track, cleverly titled Instrumental, features the classic Network sample! Yeah its also been used by Maybeshewill, Mouth of the Architect and Transit but it still kicks ass every time I hear it used!
I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore! Find a different monologue for heaven's sake!
Wiltz is just the kind of the thing I've been missing from my music diet lately. It's instrumentally technical but not too mathy, off the grid rock-structure wise but not too post rocky, and twinkly but only to a point where it keeps you interested and wanting to listen on.
If only there wasn't already an Irish band with the same credentials.... And that band is Enemies. Hah, would you look at that. No pun intended.
City of Caterpillar was super influential in the crap I listen to today. They racked up some pretty sweet spiraling post-rock and then kicked your face in with either heavy post-hardcore shouting or emo violence almost screamo screaming (guess you could just consider it emotional hardcore). They were not too frantic to a point where all direction was lost as well, which is probably the reason I could easily get into these guys with no other experience in this kind of post-rock/screamo hybrid. A nice little build up into an assault of loud ass yelling has always been my favorite kind of approach in the screamo business. It's like this, would you rather have your beloved home instantly in a blaze of fire or would you want to watch it start out from a little carpet fire? I don't know. Sometimes I don't have time to wait eiher.
City of Caterpillar will rob you of your childhood sing-a-longs and replace them with heavy fucking music if you're not careful.
France is pissed. I dunno why. But I now that Daitro kicks major, well, derrière. Daitro is also the reason I got into screamo. Real screamo. Watch your mouth. All in all, this band shows how brutal yet beautiful french screamo really is. The combination of post rock is much like the late City of Caterpillar which was actually probably the first screamo band I had ever listened to and didn't even know it. Daitro builds up a wonderfully intricate wall of sound and then smashes it all down with choatic and emotional hoot and hollering. Everything this genre is while still being their own band. What makes these french folks so mad? I dunno but I do know that the french love themselves a good riot now and then. Especially when it's about the retirement age being moved up a year.
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