The Unthanks & Radar Brothers

CD Reviews: Here's the Tender Coming, The Illustrated Garden

POSTED // Apr 7,2010 - Finally, a British folk band that doesn't beat you over the head with migraine-inducing fiddle rounds and psychedelic-colored tartans ...

Dum Dum Girls & Holly Golightly & The Brokeoffs

CD Reviews: I Will Be, Medicine Country

POSTED // Mar 31,2010 - Singer/guitarist/drummer Dee Dee’s first LP under the guise of Dum Dum Girls, I Will Be, is wrapped in reverb and bundled in fuzz, sent to the ’60s and returned via post-punk ...

Pavement & The Morning Benders

CD Reviews: Quarantine the Past, Big Echo

POSTED // Mar 24,2010 - This is the year of Pavement, though they’ve been building up to it for the last several, reissuing expanded versions of their ground-breaking albums from the ’90s...

Titus Andronicus & Wye Oak

CD Reviews: The Monitor, My Neighbor/My Creator

POSTED // Mar 17,2010 - With a name like Titus Andronicus, this band has to be heavy. Heavy like a history book, not like amplifiers that need to be crated into an arena...

Violent Soho & Ted Leo & The Pharmacists

CD Reviews: Violent Soho & The Brutalist Bricks

POSTED // Mar 10,2010 - Queensland, Australia, quartet Violent Soho are the latest signing by Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore to his Ecstatic Peace label ...

The Brian Jonestown Massacre & Robert Pollard

Reviews: Who Killed Sgt. Pepper? & We All Got Out of the Army

POSTED // Mar 3,2010 - Robert Pollard is sort of an anti-rock star. The by-now 50-something former Dayton, Ohio, schoolteacher manages to rock out without any of the supposed accessories: no tattoos ...

Adam Franklin & Cloud Cult

POSTED // Feb 17,2010 - Adam Franklin originally played guitar in the Stooges-titled band Shake Appeal, but gained widespread attention for the London-based group Swervedriver...

Gil Scott-Heron & Corinne Bailey Rae

CD Reviews: I'm Here Now, The Sea

POSTED // Feb 10,2010 - Corinne Bailey Rae rose to prominence in 2006 with her self-titled debut, an album of Starbucks-ready RB ballads whose sweet, sleepy melodies lacked the staying power of a strong double latte.

Kurt Vile & Vampire Weekend

POSTED // Jan 13,2010 - Some musicians take a while to get revved up, polishing their songs and performance until they reveal their art to the world.

Best Albums of 2009

Silver linings in sound abounded in '09.

POSTED // Dec 30,2009 - 2009 was rough. It started off with hope for change and ended with, “Well, this will do for now.” But you know that theory linking suffering to good art?