Category: CD Reviews (Page 238 of 399)

Moreland & Arbuckle: 1861

June 20, 2008 / Michael Fortes

There’s contemporary blues, and then there’s just blues. Maybe in the late 1960s, Moreland & Arbuckle would have been considered “contemporary blues,” contending with Savoy Brown and Johnny Winter for their share of a young electric blues audience. But in 2008, they’re “just blues.” And that’s definitely a good thing. No synthesizers, no importing of exotic beats, not even one single attempt to cater to an audience outside of the blues. This is the real deal – raw, unadulterated, electric blues – guitar, harmonica, and some drums to add some backbeat. Or in some cases, as on the obligatory woman-done-me-wrong song “Tell Me Why,” just an acoustic parlor guitar and some vocals for an intimate, stripped down Delta feel. Guitarist Aaron Moreland and vocalist/harmonicat Dustin Arbuckle stick to the basics here, and they do it so well, with such confidence and power, that one has to consider this record a blessing to the soul of modern music. 1861 reminds us once again that less sometimes truly is more. (LABEL: NorthernBlues 2008)

Moreland & Arbuckle MySpace page

Blues, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews

Steal This Song: ism, “Sacred Cows”

June 19, 2008 / David Medsker

Anyone who needs a temporary fix to tide them over until Muse drops their next album (rumored to be slated for late fall), this should do the trick. In fact, New York quartet ism are a little too good at the, um, Museisms, to the point where they have little identity of their own to speak of. The title track of their upcoming album, Urgency, takes elements of three Muse songs – “Time Is Running Out,” “Apocalypse Please,” and “Butterflies and Hurricanes” – and rolls them into one. They’re not awful – they just need to figure out who they really are. If there is one takeaway moment from the album, it’s this. And we’re giving it away for free download. Dig in, Museies.

Ism – Sacred Cows (Radio Edit)

Alternative, Artists, Downloads, External Music, Rock, Songs

iiO – Rapture Reconstruction Platinum Edition

June 13, 2008 / Captain Capm

For all the iiO fans who can’t get enough of the classic dance tune “Rapture,” here’s a two-disc set featuring 18 remixes of the tune. Like any collection of remixes, Rapture Reconstruction is a hit and miss experience, and of course it really all comes down to personal opinion of just which remixes are the best here. The opening “Starkillers Dirty Girl Made Single Edit” is better than “Starkillers Undone Made Single Edit” just two tracks later, for example. Part of the problem is sitting through the whole thing and not going slightly nuts from it trying to pick out the wheat from the chaff. Even the dub versions are split right down the middle of good and irritating (the spacey “Hardware & Orue Electric Dub” is light years better than the “Friscia & Lamboy Dub,” which grates pretty fast). The second disc – the “Classic Enhanced Disk”- fares no differently. The “Armin Van Buuren remix” is a good example of classic hard trance done right, while the “Deep Dish Space Remix” sounds lazy and uninspired, like any generic remix you’d care to name. If you want to get as close to the real thing, though, the “Original Extended Mix” is the very last cut here and it shines through so much of the other versions here. Sometimes sticking to the real thing is the best decision. (Made 2008)

iiO MySpace page.

Artists, CD QuickTakes, Electronica, Songs

Too $hort – Get Off the Stage

June 13, 2008 / Captain Capm

Holy Christ. Who even knew this dude was still making CDs? Look, plain and simple this is as bad as rap gets nowadays. Too $hort is still stuck in a bubble waxing about how great he is, what he has, and how he likes “big titties.” Yeah…go figure. Of course, what else to expect with tracks such as the stunning “Shittin’ On ‘Em” (“You a soldier, nigga I’m a vet, what?“) or how $hort embraces the English lexicon with the remarkable “F.U.C.K.Y.O.U.” (“Fuck you / Nigga, fuck you, too! / Nigga, F.U.C.K.Y.O.U.!“)? Yes, it’s all in a lazy, easy day’s work shitting out inconsequential track after inconsequential track and reaping the benefits of having absolutely no real talents and letting the record label pump money into your pockets. Must be real nice. But hey, who am I to complain when I can groove effortlessly to the sexy heat of “Pull Them Panties Down”? “Tryin’ to see you get naked,” exclaims Too at the beginning. Then the full-on erotica ensues: “Gotta see the pink now / G’wan pull them panties down” and “You need to let them panties leave ya ankles / Show ’em you a bad bitch, fuck these stank hos.” Ready to pull out your wallet and let your money do the voting yet? No? Really? Why not? Doesn’t hearing $hort repeat “Gotta get a bitch and get my dick sucked” over and over on “Gangstas & Strippers” not get you horny, baby? Dayum! But really, who knew this dude was still making CDs? Yeesh. (Jive 2007)

Too $hort MySpace page.

Artists, CD QuickTakes, Rap

A Kiss Could Be Deadly: A Kiss Could Be Deadly

June 13, 2008 / James B. Eldred

If a kiss is deadly, then that is one intense case of herpes. Still, don’t hate A Kiss Could Be Deadly for their idiotic complete-sentence band name. Hate them for their crap music instead. Instantly forgettable and boring, each song on the band’s self-titled debut features the dangerous one-two punch of bland music and utterly generic and forgettable lyrics which only become memorable when they fall into the realm of self-parody, like on the chorus to the puntastic “Poison IV,” which beings with the line “And you – you’re so cliché.” Irony isn’t strong enough of a word. Lead singer Lauren Baird’s whining howl of a voice doesn’t help things, either. She can’t sing, and no amount of harmonizing keyboards or the ever-so-subtle effect of an auto-tuner is going to hide that. The only thing that makes AKCBD (wow, even their abbreviated name is too long) stand out at all is their reliance on keyboards. But adding annoying synthesizers to annoying pop/punk songs doesn’t make them any better. And their electronic edge will probably be their undoing, as it makes them not emo enough for the emo kids but not electronic enough for the electronic kids either. AKCBD (yeah, that doesn’t stop being annoying) is just Paramore with a keyboard fetish. (LABEL: Metropolis 2008)

A Kiss Could Be Deadly MySpace page

Alternative, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Rock