Fun House
By The Stooges, 1970
Find in the Library

5 of 5 stars

It can take years before you understand a classic. I'd given The Stooges' Fun House multiple spins in the past only to be left scratching my head. This time around, for whatever reason, the deities of rock-n-roll rang my bell, and for the first time I got Fun House, or should I say Fun House got me. Iggy Pop's yelping mixed the Asheton brothers' sludge pit of a rhythm section is the only punk rock you'll ever need to know. The repeative slogging pushes the boundries between rock music and noise. Indeed, The Stooges are the living embodiment of critics' fears about rock music. It would appear the cavemen have crashed the party, and it's wildest one you've ever been too, the one you'll talk about for years.
Bryan @ Main

Flavors of Entanglement
By Alanis Morrissette, 2008
Find in the Library

2 1/2 of 5 stars

Alanis Morissette's best album will always be Jagged Little Pill. Most artists achieve this musical perfection on their 2nd or 3rd release. It must be extremely difficult to top one's self, but she continues to write songs and put out new records. Morissette's songwriting is at its best when she has a broken heart, and there are 2 stellar tracks on "Flavors of Entanglement" to prove it: "Not as We" and "Torch." The rest of the tracks are OK, but often too wordy and hard to understand, as well as the production making her sound a bit too much like Evanescence. Still, Flavors is worth a couple repeats in your stereo. It will grow on you.
Crystal @ Main

The Island Years
By John Cale, 1996
Find in the Library

4 of 5 Stars
Though not as much of a cult figure as his shall-be-unnamed Velvet Underground counterpart, John Cale has recorded a broad and challenging solo discography since unnamed counterpart booted him from the Velvets in 1968. This set collects a trio albums Fear, Slow Dazzle, and Helen of Troy) released in the 1970s on Island Records which have only been sporadically in print since their initial release. Though firmly rooted in rock and pop, Cale intentionally genre hops from track to track. The lyrics are obtuse, almost obscurantist, and the melodies blissful. Does it sound like your favorite indie rock band yet? Yes, it does. Recorded during a time when Cale suffered a fierce cocaine addiction and lived in a small Paris apartment intentionally listening to only the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds and a set of Gustav Mahler's complete symphonies, many consider it his peak phase.
Bryan @ Main

Unfinished Music No.2: Life with the Lions
by John Lennon and Yoko Ono, 1969
Find in the Library

5 of 5 stars
Within the avant-garde canon Yoko Ono is not a witch to be feared, but a goddess to be revered. Lesser known than its predecessor Unfinished Music No.1: Two Virgins (probably due to its lack of nude cover art), Life with Lions would be more positively regarded if created by an outsider artist or an academic composer and not one of the world’s most iconic pop stars. Dominating the record is a mammoth first cut, the twenty-six minute, “Cambridge 1969.” Lennon improvises guitar noise while Ono unleashes a concentrated banshee wail with enough power to knock the moon out of orbit. Ono is clearly the dominant figure, and though she screaming, she is control throughout, undulating the pitch for maximum glass shattering / hysteria inducing effect. Death to false metal. The rest of the album consists of bedroom recorded lowest-fi anti-folk and music concrete tape recorder experiments, i.e., direct precursors to so much of today’s underground music. Is this my favorite John Lennon record? Yes, it is.
Bryan @ Main

Get Awkward
By Be Your Own Pet, 2008
Find in the Library

4 of 5 Stars
The sophomore effort by local band Be Your Own Pet, is as fast and loud and PUNK ROCK as their first record, just a bit more polished. Song themes include (but aren't limited to) backstabbing girlfriends, secret crushes, alienation, paranoia, and not wanting to grow up. My favorite track is a tribute to Russ Meyer's Beyond the Valley of the Dolls called "The Kelly Affair," which is so darn catchy it flirts with being a straight-up pop song.
Crystal @ Main

Belladonna
By Daniel Lanois, 2005
Find in the Library

4 of 5 Stars
Better know for being a high profile rock and country producer, Lanois’ solo work isn’t afraid to venture into more ethereal realms. Belladonna is a series of short, lush pedal steel guitar instrumentals - the sonic equivalent of watching flowers bloom. Bordering on avant-improv, sometimes the melodies slip apart. Other times, with the accompaniment of light keyboard and drums, it makes you feel like you’re in the perfect bar a little too early in the afternoon. For fans of Brian Eno and Angelo Badalamenti.
Bryan @ Main

Grinderman
By Grinderman, 2007
Find in the Library

4 stars
A recent episode of Fresh Air with Terry Gross reminded me to listen to Grinderman, a 2007 side project of Nick Cave's. If literary punk rock is your bag, check it out!
Crystal @ Main

Asking For Flowers
By Kathleen Edwards, 2008
Find in the Library

Kathleen Edwards’ lyrics tell stories of flawed characters with sympathy, and her voice brings to mind a gentler Lucinda Williams.
Beth @ Southeast

Boys and Girls in America
By The Hold Steady, 2006
Find in the Library

Blender magazine said of The Hold Steady that they “sound like the best bar band in the world,” and I would have to agree.
Beth @ Southeast

Load Blown
By Black Dice, 2007
Find in the Library

5 of 5 Stars

Watina
By Andy Palacio & the Garifuna Collective, 2007
Find in the Library

I saw this by happenstance and what a great find. It was, as far as I am concerned, the best world music CD of 2007. Unfortunately it also ended up being Andy Palacio's swan song. He died in Jan 2008. The Garifuna are a descendents of Central American slaves who escaped to the mountains and forests and became intermixed with natives. Andy Palacio brings that culture and music together on this wonderfuly conceived and produced CD. Like so much of the African-American music of the Caribbean and Central/South America it feels like party music but it speaks to the trials, tribulations and hopes of the the people. If you like reggae, calypso or samba you will love this.
Jai @ Main

Critical Beatdown
By Ultramagnetic MCs, 1988
Find in the Library

4 of 5 Stars Most of the tracks being cut by Ced Gee, an unheralded member of the highly influential Boogie Down Productions, Critical Beatdown is a vibrant slice new school hip hop. It is the first record to feature Kool Keith, one of my all time favorite MCs. Keith is maniac. Recorded at a time when hip hop just beginning to split off into ideologically conflicted directions, the rhymes are equal parts gansta and backpacker. Nothing explodes like an unhinged MC going off over a simple but wicked funky breakbeat. This isn’t music for earbuds. This is music to fill the room.
Bryan @ Main

Bone Palace Ballet
By Chiodos, 2007
Find in the Library

4.37 stars I don't know how to best describe the style of this band. They do hardcore screaming metal, but the lead singer also has a sweet tenor voice that really goes more emo on the ballads. Some arrangements contain nice keyboard work, and a few of the songs have minimalistic cello passages that are reminiscent of Steve Reich. I saw them live with Linkin Park and their show was Gothic and dark, which I really liked. If classical music and heavy metal mated and had a child, Chiodos would be its weird first cousin hiding in the corner, waiting to be discovered. Plus, hands downs, they have the best song titles ever - "is it progression if a cannibal uses a fork?" or "i didn't say i was powerful, i said i was a wizard"! Gotta love that.
Amanda @ Main

Gypsum Strings
By Oakley Hall
Find in the Library

As much as you may be scared that this is some lame banjo and fiddle, it's pure hipbilly sunshine. Listen to the rolling beats of songs like "If I Was In El Dorado" and the waddling banjo in "Spanish Fandango".
Raffi @ Green Hills

Real Things
By Joe Nichols
Find in the Library

"If you live in Nashville long enough, eventually the music will rub off on you." Well, my mother was right. I can't stop listening to Joe Nichols' 2007 release "Real Things." He has the best male "traditional country" voice going right now. If you hear just one song off this record, make it "My Whiskey Years" which was co-written by Tom Hambridge and Jeffrey Steele, and beautifully interpreted by Nichols (my new favorite NOT rock'n'roll singer...).
Crystal @ Main