Wild Beasts: Smother (LP)

Kendal, England's Wild Beast's latest release Smother starts with with a pulsing, minimalist synth throb that builds in intensity over the track's 4 minutes with piano, string pads, and drum machine patter that work together to create an arresting, insistent atmosphere. Hayden Thorpe sings in ethereal voice that recalls both John Jacob Nyles' ghost warble and Brian Ferry's out of breath wheeze. But when he takes a breath and digs in, this voice is a sleeping giant waking up. In the quieter moments, repetitive sample noisebeds ala Four Tet slip in and out of the arrangements. Lyrically, Smother is a pastiche of ironic melodrama ("I will lie anywhere with you, any old bed of nails will do") sprinkled with well-timed humor ("Ophelia, I feel ya").

On the downside, Smother is the kind of a appealing but forgettable sonic moodscape that can drift into the background—it's the kind of disc that you can walk away from to use the bathroom without feeling the urge to press pause, and when you come back a new track is playing the same mood, leaving no reason to rewind. But upon careful listening, this disc packs in more interesting sounds and good arrangement ideas than many similar bands are able to stretch into an entire career.
- Will Teague

Chairlift: "Something" (LP)

Brooklyn pop duo Chairlift has produced a fantastic new LP, "Something." Patrick Wimberly and lead singer Caroline Polachek have done something that is difficult these days—they've made an interesting pop record, which stands out amongst legions of similar artists. "I Belong in Your Arms" is the duo's sultriest and most accessible tune, a fitting example of how the less complex can often be just as groundbreaking and engaging as the more so. Polachek's lyrics are both straight ahead and perfectionist, with a simplicity sure to appeal to a broad listener base. I've spent the past four days immersed in "Something," trying to resolve its multi-directional throbs and poke around all of its kitschy corners, and the only thing I can say for certain is that, while listening to it, I feel pulled completely into someone else's orbit, which is perhaps the greatest music sensation there is.
- Will Teague

Gentleman Brawlers > Poison Apple (Single)

Poison Apple is the first of a promised 6-month blitz of monthly single releases by Brooklyn's Gentleman Brawlers. Songwriter Matt Walsh, like a lot of bedroom multi-trackers, is so full of big ideas he can barely keep his focus together.  Part of the issue is that he takes inspiration from everything. Each song seems to have its own agenda. Collectively, their performance amounts to a group of songs that marries the band’s fascination with Afrobeat to its rainy day guitar shimmer and leftfield electronica moodiness, often times to gorgeous effect.

The best way to experience this band is live, as I did at the National Underground last week—Not being one of those bands who bother with belonging to a movement or a trend, the Gentleman Brawlers displayed their strong understanding of the tricks and techniques of pop's biggest and best moments, the moments that stop your breath during the pause just before the big chorus, and they set out to make an entire night of such moments.

Poison Apple will get a few asses shaking, and, like tUnEyArDs and other Brooklynites experimenting with African and Latin syncopation, the Gentleman Brawlers are restructuring rock on a sonic and rhythmic level rather than a compositional one. Poison Apple, for all its classic rock muscle and obvious influences, displays the Gentleman Brawlers as a blast of fresh air, and Walsh a place among the finer songsmiths in the Brooklyn DIY scene.

- Amanda Fortnoy

Grandaddy > Sophtware Slump (LP/Reissue)

With the right timing, an artist sometimes manages to make a recording that specifically evokes a place and time. Grandaddy’s The Sophtware Slump is impossible to listen to for me without thinking of 2000, the tech bubble bursting, Bush vs. Gore, drug fueled halloween parties you had to crawl through a window off a fire escape and pass through a giant plastic tunnel to get to.

Grandaddy attracted a devoted following at the time, as indie fans gravitated toward the band, entranced by the lazy charm of singer/guitarist/fearless leader Jason Lytle, the array of techno bleeps and bloops, and the endearing tales of dumb pilots and alcoholic androids. 

The ‘Sophtware Slump’ is a heady, beautiful and ambitious work that holds up with contemporaries such as Mercury Rev’s Deserter’s Songs, Wilco’s Summerteeth and The Flaming Lips’ The Soft Bulletin.

- Will Teague

Four Tet > There is Love in You (LP)

Leftfield electronica pioneer Four Tet returns with There Is Love In You, an LP that is a return to his melodic roots.  Opener ‘Angel Echoes’ is one of those moody sournscapes that makes you stop dead in your tracks and listen to every single sound and unsuspected note lurking in its mist. It feels connected to moments from Four Tet’s first three records, yet more focused, utilising the words from the album title placed into a puzzle of a magnificent sunset.

Each song is an exercise in craftsmanship. "My Angel Rocks Back and Forth" gently blows iron-lung sighs through ride cymbals and dirty, run-out grooves while an austere piano twinkles, hinting at the sort of gentle sounds Hebden will soon weave around English folk legend Vashti Bunyan. “Circling” gently blows pacemaker sighs through raindrop cymbals and mud puddle beats, while an old Victrola plays Mozart pizzicato.

But in There is Love in You we see one of the most talented minds in electronica and experimental music  reminding us all that he’s still just as important as ever.

- Will Teague