Benjy Ferree-Come Back to the Five and Dime, Bobby Dee Bobby Dee

Benjy Ferree Come Back to the Five and Dime, Bobby Dee Bobby Dee:

Cool doo-wop vocal harmonies and instrumental arrangements on some tracks. The album jumps around a lot stylistically, but largely sticks to extensions of popular 50's styles of music and garage rock. Most styles are pulled off well. Just ignore the abysmal lyrics and the TLDR concept of the album.

Rating: 11/15 Why couldn't you be singing about something else? points.

Thurston Moore- Trees Outside The Academy

Thurston Moore Trees Outside The Academy:

More interesting and adventurous than recent Sonic Youth releases. Lots of strings and a few bad ass guitar solos provided by J Mascis. A solid Indie Rock album.

Rating: 13/15 Sonic dads

Ugly Casanova-Sharpen Your Teeth

Ugly Casanova Sharpen Your Teeth:

Indie pop, heavy on acoustic finger-picking and strings. Tasteful layered vocals and touching lyrics make this one an interesting listen.

Rating: 11/15 Modest Mice

Red Sea Station-Red Sea Station

Red Sea Station Red Sea Station:

Heavily electronic Indie pop, not bad. The vocals and lyrics are passable as is the musical arrangement, but the keyboards ruin it for me. The lines they're playing work, but the Nintendo Sine wave sound bugs me. This album would improve drastically if the keyboard player switched to better presets.

Rating: 9/15 Unpleasant beeps

Raskolnikov's Dream - Uriel

Raskolnikov's Dream Uriel:

Jarring beats mix with the soundtrack to the original Zelda.

Rating: 5/15 Garage Band bands

Japanther-Skuffed Up My Huffy

Japanther Skuffed Up My Huffy:

If you strip away the indier than thou recording quality and the multi layered slacker vocals, you basically have Relient K.

Rating: 3/15 thinly veiled pop punk bands

Weird Owls-Ever the Silver Cord Be Loosed

Weird Owls Ever the Silver Cord Be Loosed:

Brings some post-rock weirdness combined with Neil Young-esque country rock. Cool riffs, cool lyrics, cool production. These guys have peaked my interest more so than any other new releases in the last few months.

Rating: 14/15 peaked interests

Fight Bite-Emerald Eyes

Fight Bite Emerald Eyes:

Boring minimalist Indie pop, only Sunn 0))) drones more.

Rating: 4/15 Yawn-core vocals

Asobi Seksu-Hush

Asobi Seksu Hush:

Indie pop with a dash of shoe-gaze. Remove anything potentially interesting from these two genres and you pretty much have this album.

Rating: 8/15 You're horribly outdated points

Jesus Lizard-Goat

Jesus Lizard Goat:

A solid rock album which borrows from post-punk. David Yow and crew manage to write innovative riffs while not giving up any attitude. One of the most tasteful trios in rock music, the backing band never overplays usually sticking to fairly simple riffs, allowing Yow space to do his trademark meth-addict style of vocals. Despite the delivery Yow's lyrics tend toward the intelligent and funny. A solid fucking band.

Rating: 15/15 Nineties bands which are better than Pearl Jam

Fourteen Year Old Girls - Strategy Guides

Fourteen Year Old Girls Strategy Guides:

Fuck you, this is not funny.

Rating: 2/15 for dorks who think geekyteez.com is funny stuff

Isis & Aereogramme - In The Fishtank 14

Isis & Aereogramme In The Fishtank 14:

One absolutely amazing song followed by two meh songs.

Rating: 13/15 yes thats how good that one song (Low Tide) is

Modern Life Is War - Midnight In America

Modern Life Is War Midnight In America:

It's sad to see a great band break-up, but it's nice when the final note is amazing. One of those hardcore albums that you could get away with almost not calling hardcore. Hopefully the next wave of hardcore will look at this as an example of what to do.

Rating: 13/15 intelligent windmills in the pit

Converge and Agoraphobic Nosebleed - The Poacher Diaries

Converge and Agoraphobic Nosebleed The Poacher Diaries:

A penutbutter and jelly split: Two awesome bands that just sound sound soo good together. Though one would think that grindcore and metalcore wouldn't work that well on one cd, but these two manage to make it worth. Neither side is really better than the other, just equal awesomeness. The only downside is Converge's side sounds like it was recorded in their parents' garage. Scott Hull, time to remaster that shit.

Rating: 14/15 not enough anger

Danzig - Danzig III: How The Gods Kill

Danzig Danzig III: How The Gods Kill:

Fuck “Mother” this is what people should think of when they hear the name Danzig. Here Danzig and John Christ fully realize their idea of a blues, metal, and rock fused into one lumbering, swaggering, and evil beast. Danzig belts out the most evil tunes he's ever written and John Christ backs him with sick riff after sick riff. Defiantly required metal listening.

Rating: 15/15 muscular midgets slaying demonic tang

Dillinger Escape Plan - Ire Works

Dillinger Escape Plan Ire Works:

This album is really half and half. Half of it is that wonky mathcore Dillinger's been doing for years. It's good, but gets old quickly. The stuff that'll make you listen to this cd repeatedly are the pop songs. Yeah I said pop songs. I'm not sure what to call them, but their catchy and would blow up huge on the radio so pop works well to define them. It's kind of shocking to see these guys pull off such catchy songs, but damn does it work. Hopefully Dillinger evolves this sound more.

Rating: 13/15 confused mathcore fans