Comments

I'm really waiting for Mark Knopfler to come in at any moment on some of these tracks, Highway Anxiety in particular.
holy moly, when are we getting a breakdown of this new wandering virtuoso subgenre of guitar rock? (william tyler, steve gunn, vile, and the others)
I listened to some of the songs and it really just sounds like James wants it to sound like what they sound like now, which, from reading the lede, seems to be how Ryan feels too--while still maintaining some journalistic standards haha.
I grew up in ridgewood and played in bands the microgeneration after real estate, +@, and cassie ramone; and not that it makes me an expert, but I always saw Mondanile as the weak point in real estate. I think julian lynch rocks and I'm excited to hear how he'll help the band grow its sound (ps he also played on courtney's solo album I believe?)
Eva Hendricks definitely has made me coffee at the west on union and hope in brooklyn, trippy stuff
LOSE is going to be one of the rock albums from this decade that will stand the test of time. Also, not to be a pedant homer, but can we stop calling them a "Staten Island" band? If you listened to LOSE at all you know it is a Jersey album through and through, and that the band self identifies as one also.
http://consequenceofsound.net/2016/04/stream-new-madrids-psychedelic-new-album-magnetkingmagnetqueen/ It's so fucking good, man. It's criminal these guys aren't all over the blogosphere.
New Madrid's "magnetkingmagnetqueen" is amazing and nobody will care
Idk the ethics of music blog headlines or their fact checking practices, but Mac saying, "I just had penis enlargement surgery so my balance is all out of whack and I can't play my drums properly right now, but soon enough I'll get used to this new piece," seems more tongue in cheek than medically accurate. But whatever, may DeMarco's D be long and prosperous
those singles scared me, but it all makes sense here. serious boogie, dancing at his shows is top notch.
It was my first favorite; but man, At Dawn? Those two albums are just mental whirlwinds. Each ends and you look up and ask, "where am I?" Amazing
FUCKING ENOUGH ALREADY!! But honestly, best rapper to rock a hockey jersey. I always hated the shitty the rest of the group treated Phife at the end of the the band's career, but he handled it with total grace. "Every dawg has his day but F that it's my year" I'll never forget hotboxing cars in high school, driving on route 17 and the surrounding suburbs, and listening to ATCQ albums, trying our hands over some of the beats. Enjoy heaven's cipher, Phife di-dawg.
If you haven't heard this guy's previous album "The Bearer of Bad News" and you like early Paul Simon, it will certainly be a treat.
Idk I love Sturgill but this sounds like what happened when the Black Keys hit mid-career and just put that chunky fuzz tone over everything, sheen over substance.
so many cool ones have been mentioned but I'll point out Sharon Van Etten doing "To Lay me Down" is so cool, so is Ira Kaplan doing "Wharf Rat". Jim James will be perfect, but to the point where it's just like "oh right, yeah"--the ooo's in the middle will be silo reverb perfection.
Wow, this is hard to believe. I remember being high at night on a baseball field in the Berkshires listening to this record, with what must've been a iPod dock speaker, when all of us realized collectively that this album was a goodbye, and got real fucking dark, before ultimately ending by showing us that death needs to be a celebration of life rather than fear of our humanity, one where we all must leave our bodies. One of the best records ever and certainly of the new century.
woah, definitely getting into some Kinks flavors here, these guys are rock steady.
[chanting] Dollar Days -- Dollar Days -- Dollar Days
yardboat is great too, considering they did it three days, too. Also, I think side B is what puts Sunswimmer over the top. I don't think you can view them as like stand alone tracks, the album is really one piece of music and "And She Smiles" takes you places. I'm all a deadhead, so my tolerance for long songs is strong.
YES! Finally, these guys are getting their look. "Sunswimmer" is one of the most under appreciated albums of this decade, it's a total trip and lodges itself in a headspace where it never bores. Good guys, all super down to earth, hope they hit that next level.
Oh man a co-headline tour from these two would thrust them right to the top of national spotlight. I think the true country, outlaw, western revival is imminent, if not already upon us.
I really think Mondanile, as nice and great a person he is, might be one of the least creative, schooled guitar players in a major band today. I think he has to know it too. He's a total sweetheart, but I don't think he can play a blues scale.
great songs from a wonderful album, but good lord what an awful mix.
But you have to think within the context of this label. A lot of these bands and their members probably barbacked and worked shit day jobs to get signed. These are people who are (generally speaking) weary or skeptical of money and probably see taking it from a truly sociopathic industrial titan as bad as raising those drug prices themselves. But this also isn't new to the world of music, Nine West (an amazing label) has largely been funded by Coca Cola heirs. I really don't care. Sometimes horrible things have begotten beautiful things, and that's better than throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Oh god, yes. I could walk for eternity listening to Water Wheel and Lurker. I'll take Steve Gunn over Kurt Vile any day, no dissin' Kurt--[mumbly, kurt vile type of throwaway lyric]
Gotta say, this new Craig Finn album really surprised me. He's hitting on a new Springsteen wave that he couldn't in Hold Steady. Really a wonderful album, subtle and melancholy.
also the art looks a lot like Gregory Crewdson from YLT "Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out"--very cool
Hell yes. These guys are wonderful, great live show, great dudes, too. But they're an Athens band, not Atlanta. I'll say it here, this will be there breakout album, the first two are absolute pleasure, but I think this is their maturation point. Good luck
Does anyone else enjoy this more than "To Pimp a Butterfly"? For all the George Clinton on TPAB I feel SURF captured more of that spontaneity that Clinton became so famous for.
Great effort on this essay, but we all know there's still an untapped wellspring cultural phenomena to this band that only history will show us. If nothing else you gave us a descriptor that will stick with this history of this band: "[...]catharsis is so crucial to their music; this is why James’ voice and the voluminous reverb and the seven- or eight-minute multi-part sagas are so crucial to their music. They never sink into depletion in a musical or physical landscape where they easily could. And they’d get something great out of it, too. But they commit, fully and over-the-top, to the idea that there’s always more to discover and explore." Brilliant. I think what's so intriguing about this band is that they really don't fit in. They have a space all to themselves and have no shame exploring it however they see fit. It's a beautiful thing. Thanks.
lmao that solo at 2:20 is so jerry, was cracking up when he said it.
10cc's serious cousin or ELO's artsy son.
Kevin Parker is making Tame Impala into 10cc's serious cousin, and it's pretty cool. Also, the texture of the song is way better now with guitar in the beginning.
great song, but a capo on a ukulele is fucking hilarious
this will be one of the live killers on the album
also getting some heavy Bruce vibes on this single too
This guy is unbelievable. We are so spoiled that Father John Misty and Matthew E White just produced two of the richest albums of the decade thus far within the space of a few weeks!
Also, did know anything about Darkside, but now I know this man, Dave Harrington, can fucking shread.