Reviews
Melody’s Echo Chamber’s Emotional Eternal Offers a Cure for a Dour Present
When we first met Melody Prochet, the Paris-based singer-songwriter wasn’t mourning love lost; she was patiently feeding lost love to a sonic kaleidoscope and minting a DayGlo, beat-assisted species of shoegaze as lush, warm, and candied as Cam’ron’s 2002-2005 wardrobe or an interactive Yayoi Kusama installation. Her project’s 2012 debut remains a psychoactive magic carpet ride of an LP where sentiments matter far less than the euphoria the surrounding music evokes in a listener: smeared effects bubbling out of caldrons, glistening guitars rambling along in multi-tracked splendor, reverb forever, infinite hooks. Fans of Stereolab and My Bloody Valentine might find common cause in the yearning of “I Follow You” or the sprawled elation of “Mount Hopeless.” Prochet sings with a breathy intens...
Bloc Party Relishes in Their Signature Sound on Alpha Games
When Bloc Party released their debut studio album, Silent Alarm, in 2005, it garnered the kind of praise that young, bright-eyed musicians fantasize about. Earnest comparisons to legendary acts like Blur, U2 and The Cure were just the beginning. They, alongside bands like Franz Ferdinand and The Futureheads, were considered an intricate part of indie rock’s revival in the aughts. Syncopated rhythms and feverish vocals — paired with a distinctive approach to quality craftsmanship — made for dancefloor gold. This momentum would continue with Bloc Party’s subsequent full-length albums, A Weekend in the City (2007) and Intimacy (2008). Both records were soaked in the same kind of urgency and passion as their wildly successful debut. It noticeably came to a halt on their fourth album, though, t...
One Nation Under a Stylus
Vinyl Nation, a new documentary from directors Kevin Smokler and Christopher Boone, is, as the title may suggest, as much a chronicle about a growing community than it is about the medium of vinyl records. To be clear, the history of vinyl pressing, from its early market dominance to its later decline due to the advent of the compact disc, to its glorious return over the past decade — nearly 42 million records were sold in 2021(outselling CDs for the first time since 1986!) — is thoroughly covered (occasionally bordering on repetitive) by the filmmakers. The focus, however, is more on the collectors. The film opens outside the Mills Record Company in Kansas City. It’s Record Store Day, an annual celebration of independent record stores across the country, and a long line of collectors, obs...
Spiritualized Deliver an Ethereal Space Rock Album With Everything Was Beautiful
At a time when it would be understandable to pack things in, Spiritualized leader J Spaceman (Jason Pierce) found himself thriving in the past few years of isolation. As he’d walk through an eerily silent London, Spaceman found himself inspired by the world “full of birdsong and strangeness and no contrails.” The experience allowed him to create a largely self-referential record run by an overwhelming sense of urgency within the tracks. With that in mind, Spiritualized’s latest album, Everything Was Beautiful, is an homage to themselves. The album is curated like a museum, preserving the best of their sound while polishing the crucial details. Spaceman continues to fine-tune his astral pop sound with shocking consistency throughout the familiar but delightfully hypnotic space rock album. T...
The Staircase Takes a Winding Path Through the Infamous Michael Peterson Case: Review
The Pitch: It’s one of the most infamous murder cases in the 21st century: On December 9th, 2001, Kathleen Peterson (Toni Collette) was found dead at the foot of the staircase in her Durham, North Carolina home, having bled out from a suspiciously large number of head wounds. The only one home was her husband, novelist and mayoral candidate Michael Peterson (Colin Firth), who called 911 and explained through tears that she’d fallen down the stairs. But the event’s strain on the Peterson family compounds as Kathleen’s death opens up fissures between the blended family, to say nothing of the suspicion Michael faces as his wife’s possible murderer. As the trial heats up, and more secrets come out about Michael’s hidden life, the family — and the French documentary crew filming him and th...
Better Call Saul Recap: When You Can’t Run Any Further
[Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers for Better Call Saul Season 6 Episode 3, “Rock and Hard Place.” For our recap of Episode 2, click here] Case Summary While other things happen in the third episode of Better Call Saul, “Rock and Hard Place” should be forever remembered as The Nacho Episode, for very good reason. Nacho isn’t the first series regular to perish over the course of the show’s run — that honor belongs to Chuck McGill (Michael McKean). But Michael Mando delivers a simply staggering performance in his theoretical swan song, facing a fate which might have seemed inevitable from the beginning, but is still heartbreaking to watch. Writer/director Gordon Smith delivers Nacho to his end with an episode so deliberately paced that the dread builds more and more with each de...
The Who Kick Off 2022 North American Tour in Florida: Recap + Setlist
When it comes to playing guitar, Pete Townshend makes it look easy. Noodling up and down the frets and whipping his right arm about for a round of his signature windmills, he still looks every bit the rock star who once dramatically smashed his instrument onstage in a bid to outperform Jimi Hendrix at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival. “This is what I do,” boasted The Who’s mastermind at the Hard Rock Live in Hollywood, Florida on Friday night (April 22nd), as he kicked into the recognizable guitar groove of the band’s “Who Are You.” It was the ninth song from a cathartic 24-song set on the first night of “The Who Hits Back!” tour (grab tickets via Ticketmaster), and the band’s first proper concert in more than two years. The setlist mirrored that of 2019’s “Moving On!” tour, and for good rea...
Nicolas Cage Is Back in a Big Way in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent
There are multiple Nic Cages on display in the new meta action-comedy The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent: the financially struggling actor with a penchant for lavish purchases and hotel stays that would bankrupt the budget of Vermont; a less-than-attentive father who means well but is quickly losing the patience of his teenage daughter; and, above all, the artist devoted to his craft. Oh, and there’s also Nicky, the Vampire’s Kiss-era Cage who haunts the real Nic Cage, who is there to remind the thespian that he’s first and foremost a movie star. For Nicky, it’s less artsy, more fartsy. So, then, I wonder what Nicky, with his glued-on pompadour and leather jacket, would think of his flesh and blood counterpart’s newest (and welcomed return to) big screen joint? My guess is he would lo...
We Own This City Is a Comprehensive, Heartbreaking Account of a City in Ruins: Review
The Pitch: The tragic death of Freddie Gray in 2015 while in police custody was a watershed moment for Baltimore; Black communities and activists erupted in protest against the overwhelming presence of (and abuse by) Baltimore Police Department officers, who frequently dispensed justice at the end of a baton. And in 2017, the city saw the closest thing that’s come to accountability, with the arrests of the members of BPD’s Gun Trace Task Force — a unit specifically tasked with taking guns and drugs off the streets of Baltimore, but who instead used their institutional power to enrich themselves. Drugs planted in cars to justify arrests, seized cash going missing, violent crackdowns on anyone who looks at them funny: it was just another day on the job, particularly for the GTTF’s hothe...
Metallica’s Kirk Hammett Indulges Classical and Prog Tendencies on His Excellent Debut Solo EP Portals: Review
For a band with a such a storied career as Metallica, it is rather surprising that the longtime active members haven’t ventured off into various solo projects. That said, if we were to have wagered which member was most likely to go it alone, our best bet would’ve been Kirk Hammett. For years we’ve been hearing about the guitarist stockpiling hundreds, if not thousands of riffs on his phone. Considering Metallica’s deliberate workflow, only so many of these riffs and melodies, if any, will actually make it onto one of their records. Kirk needed an outlet, and he found it with his debut solo EP, Portals. No, this isn’t Kirk’s foray into becoming a singer-songwriter. Rather, the four-song release is entirely instrumental and contains minimal traces of heavy metal. Hammett said he took a “Aud...
The Diverse Appeal of King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard’s Omnium Gatherum
Australia’s King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard are easily among the most prolific and versatile acts of the last couple of decades. They’ve put out nearly two dozen collections since 2012, with several years spawning multiple releases each. Plus, their highly adventurous blends of psychedelic rock, hip-hop, garage rock, metal, ambient, dream pop, and electronic evoke artists as wide-ranging as Pink Floyd, Motörhead, Childish Gambino, Japanese Breakfast, Black Midi, and Tame Impala. Considering their talent and tenacity, it was only a matter of time before they pushed themselves further than ever by creating a double album. Indeed, Omnium Gatherum — which has more in common with 2021’s welcomingly exploratory Butterfly 3000 than it does last month’s avant-garde Made in Timeland — is essen...
On It’s Almost Dry, The Game Pulls Pusha T Back In
Almost every gangster movie or its sequel features a character going legit. Or trying as hard as they can. Scene after scene in The Godfather and The Godfather Part II show Michael Corleone telling anyone who will listen that the Corleone family is walking on the side of the angels after one, two, or a dozen more scores. For Pusha T, his 2018 opus Daytona was his massive score. Push distilled everything about his dope brand of hardcore hip-hop into an almost perfect seven-track piece of work. It’s Almost Dry, due out this Friday (April 22nd), feels like the reflections of a former gangster doing his best to live a regular life. But, to paraphrase the head of the Corleone family, just when Push thinks he’s out, the game pulls him back in. While not as strong as Daytona, It’s Almost Dry is m...
