The Lodger

Has it really been a year since The Lodger released their first album Grown-Ups? Here they are again with their new LP Life is Sweet, not even twelve months later, turning it up a notch with crisp production to further refine their Yorkshire pop sensibilities. Let’s just hope that they can keep up this pace!

Original Post 6/17/2007:
I’m starting to worry. Maybe cause it was my birthday recently I’m getting all nostalgic. Yes, I know things go in cycles, and the past few years of music have been heavily borrowing from the 80’s, but that was my decade. I would hold a tape recorder up to the radio to record Wang Cheung. I bought Tears for Fears on tape, Joy Division on vinyl, the Smiths on CD, Camper van Beathoven on a t-shirt, and the Cure on a poster. I saw the Descendents live and Dance Craze and Athens, Ga, Inside/Out on VHS. The 80’s were good to me. But it’s the next cycle that’s starting to worry me. Don’t tell me you haven’t seen the kids starting to sport long stringy hair and flannel shirts. We’re on a fine line between the next “scene” going hippie or retro Pearl Jam. Let’s just get it out of the way before my kids hit their teenage years.

The Lodger and their fine Yorkshire guitar pop, though, ain’t going down without a fight. While influenced and even motivated by the songwriting of such guitar pop stalwarts as the Wedding Present and the Housemartins, this Leeds band’s debut album Grown-ups, adds their own personal touch and a host of modern sensibilities, like crisp melodies, high-energy honesty and reverb-free drums, all evidenced in the outstanding “Let Her Go.” Just what an old fella needs to feel young again.

Continue reading “The Lodger”

Julie Ocean

The heat wave blasting Los Angeles has got me pining for summer and sparkly bright summery tunes. I’m swimming in the latter thanks to Julie Ocean. Featuring Jim Spellman of Velocity Girl and a handful of other post-punk DC notables, Julie Ocean does 10 punky-pop songs in just over 25 minutes. They’re sweet, catchy, and quick. Remember the Christopher Walken “cowbell” sketch? I can imagine Julie Ocean playing in that sketch and Walken telling them, “you know what you need are more handclaps.” All their songs are handclap friendly, but thankfully they don’t indulge themselves until the very end of the record. Just like Walken says of BÖC, Julie Ocean “appears to have a dynamite sound.”

Continue reading “Julie Ocean”

Soccer Team

Must admit, I’ve always wanted to have a 3hive soccer team. Many years ago, I scored over Jon’s head straight from a kickoff while he was in goal. And my most vivid memory of playing against Sam is blocking one of his shots with my face, only for the ball to drop right back onto his foot so he could slam it into the back of the net anyway, leaving me with a red face (due, in part, to a bloody nose). So maybe it would be better to have 3hive sponsor a soccer team, you know with our logo plastered on the front of the team’s jerseys.

Ryan and Melissa, both employees of Dischord at one point, included this little gem on their 2006 LP ‘Volunteered’ Civility and Professionalism. Yes, it’s a bit old, but it’s new to me and I’m kicking myself for missing it until now. The LP displays their very clever, lo-fi pop, moving from fuzzy and effects-laden guitar, to pounding drums, strumming acoustic guitars, and everywhere in between, recorded to 8- and 4-track tape. That resulting tape hiss? I think they wanted us to hear it.

Continue reading “Soccer Team”

The Awkward Stage

The Awkward Stage ended up being one of my happy finds, with “West Van Girl,” “1000 Teenage Hearts,” and the title track from Shane Nelken’s debut album, Heaven is for Easy Girls, all being worth at least $.99 at the legal download site of your choice. Hopefully the band’s sophomore spin, Slimming Mirrors, Flattering Lights — out in June, two days before my birthday! (hint, hint, Mint Records) — will offer up another set of smart Canadian pop from the sensitive and supremely talented Nelken. “Anime Eyes” is a rocking little piece of candy sweetly luring us in.

Anime Eyes [MP3, 3.4MB, 128kbps]

Original post: 09/28/06
About The Awkward Stage, my friend Tim O. has this to say: “Here’s an album in the grand tradition of geek rock, as in Weezer, Beck, etc., even though The Awkward Stage doesn’t sound like any of them. Strong melodies and pop hooks lead a slight voice through cleverly-titled, literate and ultimately pathetic songs. Even the cover art depicts lead singer Shane Nelken going to prom with a blow-up doll while wearing a retainer and head gear. In fact, I heard Joe had the same head gear in middle school.” Wait a minute, there… Well, that’s enough from Tim O. on the subject. Oh no, wait, he has one more thing to say. “While the title track claims ‘The Morons are Winning,’ The Awkward Stage are clearly figthing back.” Brilliantly pithy, T.O. Look for Heaven is for Easy Girls on October 10.

Continue reading “The Awkward Stage”

The Sound of Arrows

I just felt it in the air. It’s a warm fuzzy feeling in that glob of fat my skull houses, otherwise known as a brain. This warm fuzzy feeling reminds me to check in on the label that consistently provides me with warm fuzzy music: Labrador. They just signed a Stockholm duo, The Sound of Arrows, who dress as if they’re living on a polygamist ranch in Texas and sound like The Avalanches mixing Placebo. I look forward to hearing more from these pleasantly pastel pals when their 9-song EP is out in May.

Continue reading “The Sound of Arrows”

Stars Like Fleas

Stars Like Fleas is a Brooklyn-based collective of musicians you probably haven’t heard of from bands you probably have heard of (especially if you’re a regular to 3hive). At the nucleus are Montgomery Knott (vocals) and Shannon Fields (everything else). It was Shannon who emailed us to say that Stars Like Fleas will be releasing their third album after “a fair bit of wandering-in-the-desert time.” That’s gotta be some kind of crazy metaphor ’cause they recorded the album in Iceland—with Bjork’s producer, Valgeir Sigurðsson—and I don’t think there are any deserts there. Wherever it was that they wandered, they appear to have lost their penchant for unstructured, free jazz compositions and replaced it with a knack for lushly-orchestrated pop epics. The single, “I Was Only Dancing,” is a precise audio replication of a cloudburst falling on parched earth, sandwiched between slices of warm sunlight. Bathe/bask in it and you’ll see why it’s already one of my favorites of the year.

Continue reading “Stars Like Fleas”

Martina Topley Bird

I was surprised to find these tracks in my in-box. They’re quite the weekend treat. As you might imagine I spend a fair amount of time scouring the web for new music and I haven’t heard a peep from the Independiente label since DeeJay Punk-Roc’s ’98 release of Chicken Eye. Obviously I’m not listening closely enough. They’re Travis’ UK label. OK, so I’ve got some catching up to do. And besides the occasional David Holmes or Diplo track she sings on, I haven’t spent quality time with Ms. Topley-Bird. That’s gonna change too. Today. String theorists searching for other dimensions just may find what they’re looking for if they’d get strung out on some MTB. Topley-Bird’s voice carries me to other worlds, worlds I first discovered listening to Tricky’s Maxinquaye where she played the beautifully haunting foil to his gravelly trip-hop hero. Topley-Bird herself is off on her own inter-genre exploration with co-pilot/producer Dangermouse. Whether it’s the dusty after hours slow-mo of “Valentine,” the playfully seductive “Carnies,” or this bumpin’ club remix of “Poison” Martina Topley Bird’s buttery-rich voice easily lilts your soul enough to keep you just on this side of an out of body experience.

Continue reading “Martina Topley Bird”

Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin

Hey, I’m only a week late on the new Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin. Their last record was my favorite-album-that-took-me-a-year-to-listen-to. The CD kept getting shuffled to the bottom of my ‘listen to’ stack. Their name haunted me. I just couldn’t let go of a band called SSLYBY. To this day I still throw up a little in my mouth when I think of how much joy I missed by not having SSLYBY in my life sooner. From what I’ve heard, album number two from the Show Me State’s favorite indie sons, keeps the charming pop meter cranked up to eleven. Nothing groundbreaking except to say that their sophomore album is anything but sophomoric. New album and new tour NOW.

Think I Wanna Die [MP3, 3.9MB, 192kbps]

Kassin+2

My opinion on and knowledge of Brazilian music and film are about the same: I like what I see and hear, but I can’t claim to have heard a whole lot. Although I will say that if you haven’t seen City of God you haven’t truly lived. That’s only a little bit exaggerated. I like what I heard of this Kassin+2 as well. Apparently they’re a pretty big deal on their home soil, and this record is a big deal for how, gasp, accessible it is. Yep, “Ya Ya Ya” is probably one of the more edgy tracks on the album—most of the rest plays out with the bossa nova warmth you might expect from the various members of the Gilberto clan. If they can get experimental with the same gusto that they get smooth, they’ll be spending plenty of time on my iPod as the weather gets warmer and the days get longer.

Continue reading “Kassin+2”

Tappan Zee

In one of Douglas Coupland’s novels, maybe All Families are Psychotic, there’s a passage about how we lived in a golden age, without pain or fear, something like that… When I found Tappan Zee one day last year while digging around the Internet, that idea came back to me. Check out their introduction on the Wormco website — “It’s 1999. . . . . and what have we got to show for it?” etc. Just a little reflection, like finding an old newspaper from before you were married or had kids, from before the war, before 9/11. I like “The Only Ones,” nice and simple indie rock from the good old days, eh? Whatever happened to Tappan Zee?

Continue reading “Tappan Zee”