Forget marching to the beat of your own drummer; Van Hunt’s got his own band, and he’s leading his feisty, wildly imaginative brand of r&b into the pop music stratosphere all by himself. To rewind, there was totally a time that the singer/songwriter had an illustrious little major-label career brewing. His first record, Van Hunt, didn’t set the world on fire, but was reasonably well-received; his second, On the Jungle Floor , is rightfully acknowledged as a classic by anyone who’s heard it. There’s […]
Posts tagged "Spin Cycle"
Spin Cycle: Tori Amos’ “Night of Hunters”
Tori Amos’ latest album is high-concept, a little obtuse, and often very, very pretty. At this point, you’d do well to note the date, as that sentence could have been written about every Tori Amos album that’s ever been made. It’s interesting, though, to follow the trajectory of Tori’s career. Early records like Little Earthquakes and Under the Pink are justly heralded as classics – even as, looking back on them, they’re hardly emblematic of the artist Tori would turn into. They’re […]
Spin Cycle: Lady Antebellum’s “Own The Night”
Somewhere along the line, Lady Antebellum changed from just another country group (albeit one with a regrettable choice of name) into the hottest group in music, period. A hit single and a couple of Grammys has a way of doing that for you. At the beginning of 2010, the single and album Need You Now elevated the co-ed trio (consisting of Hillary Scott, Charles Kelley and Dave Haywood) to cross-genre superstardom (it even had a dance remix). With their third […]
Spin Cycle: Pearl Jam’s “Pearl Jam Twenty”
Comprehensive and wildly varied, it is nevertheless important to note that the Cameron Crowe-helmed soundtrack to his Pearl Jam documentary is not a catch-all for the casual fan, or even a career-spanning bid to win new converts. Indeed, Cameron Crowe has been an avowed Pearl Jam fan since jump street, and his soundtrack (and, presumably, his film) reflects this – the two-disc Pearl Jam Twenty has far less in common with their proper hits compilation Rearviewmirror than with their stellar b-sides record […]
Spin Cycle: Girls’ “Father, Son, Holy Ghost”
If a cursory glance of Pitchfork’s “one-record-you’ve-heard-of-a-week” album review archive makes you shake your head, convinced that you just don’t get indie music anymore, you’re within your rights; if only something could come along, make you feel, transport you back to a bygone era. Something like that. Enter Girls. Their 2009 debut album Album seemed to often be a case of “I know I like this because several tastemaking critics have told me so” – far from bad, but often sort of […]
Spin Cycle: Ladytron’s “Gravity The Seducer”
Of the slew of huge releases this week, Ladytron’s Gravity The Seducer was the one that kept flying under the radar for me. Primus, Anthrax, Staind, even Bush were the ones I kept citing off the top of my head when talking about releases for the 13th. And then Gravity… slowly crept up and knocked me on my ass. Let’s be clear on one fact: Ladytron do not make bad albums. Like a finely tuned machine, they churn out albums […]
Spin Cycle: Mogwai’s “Earth Division” EP
Mogwai is a giant name in the post-rock genre, and rightfully so. They’ve been putting out great music since ’97 and show no signs of stopping any time soon. Earth Division displays a quieter side to Mogwai, leaving the pounding drums and fuzz-soaked guitars (though not entirely) out, making for a much different listening experience. Though the sound isn’t necessarily what one would expect from a Mogwai album the general feeling is still there, as Earth Division still manages to […]
Spin Cycle: Apathy’s “Honkey Kong”
I’m an old school/classic era hip hop junkie, straight up. Since Christmas day, 9 years old when I got my JVC boombox with Run DMC & the Fat Boys self-titled debut tapes to go with it, I was hooked for life. The next ten plus years were great to me, but somewhere along the line the game changed, and not for the better. With few exceptions, since the great era of the mid 90’s I’ve been pretty apathetic towards the […]
Spin Cycle: Hugh Laurie’s “Let Them Talk”
Hey, who wants to read a formulaic paragraph about how actors who turn to music typically churn out vanity projects that nobody ends up liking, citing Bruce Willis and Keanu Reeves as particularly egregious examples? …Good, because I’m not interested in writing it. In other news, House M.D. made a blues record. As it turns out, Hugh Laurie – star of television’s hugely-popular House, among other things – is both an accomplished musician and a tremendous fan of the blues. His […]
Spin Cycle: Brett Detar’s “Bird in the Tangle”
The amazing thing about people (and musicians are, despite the rumors, also people) is that we are rarely static entities. Time and age have a funny way of sculpting our tastes and experiences, to the point that we may not even recognize ourselves in a decade or so. Brett Detar’s debut solo album Bird in the Tangle is a sonic testament to this truth. After turns as a guitarist in metalcore pioneers Zao and as lead vocalist for the indie/alternative […]
