indie pop

Pink Nasty

payal — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 20:00:00 +0000

As a Pink Nasty novice, I was pleasantly surprised when I found out that her musical style is a cross between Weezer and Rilo Kiley/Jenny Lewis. Hailing from Wichita, Kansas, Sara Beck, aka Pink Nasty, is rapper Black Nasty’s sister (apparently Black Nasty gave his little sis her name). She describes her music as "neurotic pop", which—as a feminist—I want to reject: is it based on the notion that heartfelt, raw lyrics are neurotic, or more specifically ‘neurotically female’? (Or, maybe I am just being a little neurotic).

Sara Beck has a powerful voice and makes no excuses for her bold lyrics that tell the story of inner monologues and conversations and arguments we’ve all had. In Pink Nasty’s own words, her music is “as if Julian Casablancas and Rivers Cuomo had a baby and guess what—it’s a girl!”

If she was your friend, she’d probably write you long emails of run-on sentences, spurting platitudes as well as brilliant insights. But count yourself lucky, you can hear her do that. She is one who could sing love ballads for a living with big studio-produced backing but we are fortunate that she has chosen the country/alt. rock combo that can have you nodding your head, banging your air-drums or quietly gripping that place where your heart is because at the end of the day, the drama of relationships and all the ‘neurosis’ it can deliver is universal. And, it sounds sexy as hell. Just listen to this line that got stuck in my head on the Underground so hard that I wanted to shout it out: "Down in the dirt, in my skirt, I will waaaaait!" (“Prince Pavement”). Is it just the banality of stringing together words that rhyme? Find out for yourself. This one is worth a listen.

Written by: Anna Matussek, March 1st 2011

Fall of Spring

beth — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 16:00:00 +0000

By Lonely Drifter Karen

Crammed Discs

Here I sit, thinking about the torrential rain and wind blanketing the eastern seaboard, and dreaming of warm kisses from the sun on a hilly bike ride in the country. I’m at work, to tell you all the truth, inside a rather chilly library (writing on my lunch break—too bleak to venture outside). My eyes move slowly from computer screen to rain-dappled window, yearning for a summer that wasn’t. A summer that should have been warm rather than sweltering; a summer that should have been speckled with relaxing days on quiet beaches rather than full of stressful agonizing weeks watching the economy wilt in the heat; and my friends and family face foreclosure, unemployment, and bankruptcy. The fact is, I need a break. We all do.

This is where Lonely Drifter Karen floats in, propelled on the light wings of twee, ukulele, and Spanish-tickled guitar. They are a group of European musicians who make a miserable storm-soaked Philadelphia day seem instead like a mild spring afternoon in Brussels. “Russian Bells” in particular has a lilting Belle and Sebastian feeling, leaving me wishing that I had a comfortable picnic place to enjoy a glass of wine and a slab of baguette with my fiancee. I close my eyes and tune out the electronic hum of the xerox machine, and dream of us dancing to the sweet ballet melody of “Julien,” carefree and barefoot in the grass.

Fall of Spring is a record that is as complex as it is airy and simplistic. They’re not only grounded by lazy pop harmonies that sound like they should be streaming out of the speakers at your local Banana Republic (although “Russian Bells” would seem to go nicely with a pair of finely crafted chino pants). They’re also dark and mysterious at times, backed by ghostly guitar reverb on “Eventually,” and punctuated by energetic hand slaps and dramatic growling piano on the gypsy folk influenced “A Roof Somewhere.”

Watching their live videos on YouTube reminds me of seeing Neko Case in concert—they’ve got their shit together, so to speak. Like the powerhouse that is Ms. Case, they are everything in concert that they are on their record. Lonely Drifter Karen sounds fantastic live, and clearly has a mess of talent behind a European charm that is unsullied by Auto-Tune or studio-mixing gymnastics. Perhaps, though, what make them work the best is their uncanny ability to take me away, even if just for a moment, to a sun-drenched European countryside. A girl can dream, can’t she?

Written by: Emily S. Dunster, October 13th 2010

Secret Transit

mandy — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 18:00:00 +0000

By KaiserCartel

Daniel Records

Even the most ramshackle noise requires a hint of skill to be executed effectively. Despite dismissive cries from its many detractors, good pop music requires a precise attention to detail, a keen ear, and a strong awareness of how to strike that delicate balance between catchy and plaintive. That being said, there is also a delicate balance to be struck between polished crystalline pop and overly savvy saccharine songs. It's just this sort of precarious tightrope that Brooklyn indie pop duo KaiserCartel seems to walk with their second full-length album, Secret Transit.

Secret Transit epitomizes a transitional album. It starts out loping and haunted with “Riverboat Dream.” The song is full of shadows and riverbanks, slow tambourine beats and gently lapping water. It sounds like it would be right at home on a mixed CD, preceded by the Raveonettes and followed by Mazzy Star.

Then it's right into “Carroll Street Station,” a bubbly toe-tapper about love and landmarks that takes its title from a subway stop located on a street of the same name located at the border of Carroll Gardens, a neighborhood in Brooklyn. Indeed, much of KaiserCartel's musical identity seems inextricably linked with Brooklyn. In fact, two of their songs were used on Season One of the HBO series Bored to Death, a show based in Carroll Gardens and starring Jason Schwartzman, Ted Danson, and Zach Galifianakis.

The chipper pop of “Falling” seems strange in the overall context of the album. Something about it just feels off. It sounds like a mid-1980s one-hit wonder. Speaking of '80s pop radio, KaiserCartel cover the John Mellencamp song “Worn Out Nervous Condition,” originally released on Mellencamp's album Cuttin' Heads. For Courtney Kaiser, it's a thoughtful shout out to her former boss; she was a member of Mellencamp's band for three years. It's a nice gesture, but so is a fruit basket and a thank you card—neither of which listeners have to experience.

I consider a song good if, upon my first hearing it, I find myself singing along by the end. I had just this experience with “Minefield.” I think it's the strongest song on the album. It most successfully achieves a fusion of the creepy and the catchy that seems hit-or-miss with the other songs. On the flipside, “Wherever You Go” is a lovely enough track, but what's with the ringing alarm clock in the background? Is someone playing with an egg timer or something? Whatever it is, it detracts from the song and distracts this listener.

Courtney Kaiser and Benajmin Cartel are clearly pop music aficionados with ears attuned to the finer points of pop songwriting: catchy lyrics, ooohs and handclaps, strategically placed harmonies, and (except for “The Wait”) tracks that are under five minutes long. For the most part, theirs are beautiful, well-constructed songs. Yet what they seem to lack on this latest outing is an ability to put together a cohesive setlist. KaiserCartel fare much better with the eerie and the ethereal than they do with the indie pop. It's like they're trying to cram two completely different EPs worth of music into one full-length album—and sell themselves short in the process.

Written by: M. Brianna Stallings, September 21st 2010

Manners

admin — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 00:00:00 +0000

By Passion Pit

Colombia Records

To get the most out of Passion Pit’s debut album, you will need: a healthy appetite for sugary keyboard riffs, plenty of enthusiasm for falsetto vocals, and a large space in which to dance around like crazy. Having gathered these things, you can dive straight into Manners and experience all the colours promised by the album’s cover art. This is music that isn’t afraid of a bit of fluoro.

But once you’ve danced around the room a few times and flopped down on the couch, you might start to notice that there’s darkness in Passion Pit’s world as well. In between those insistent beats and sparkling keyboards, composer Michael Angelokos is asking questions like, "Is this the way my life has got to be?" and "Why do I always need to need you when you’re fleeting?," or simply requesting that we leave him alone.

Angelokos launched Passion Pit three years ago as "a humble one-man multi-track laptop project" from his college dorm room. Since then, he has managed to create Manners and gather a band to perform the album live. Passion Pit even had a hit on the Billboard Heatseekers chart with "Sleepyhead," which made it to number nine.

Passion Pit’s website describes Manners as "baroque and intricate in its construction," which sums up both its appeal and its main stumbling block. There’s enough going on here to sustain multiple listens, but perhaps too much for us to ever really get a grip on the emotion behind the material. Angelokos is in there somewhere, but more often than not, he’s obscured by the blinding brightness of his music.

If the emotion on Manners is hard to make out, its take on gender is all but buried. While Angelokos is generally singing to or about a "you," the identity of this person—like much of the album’s lyrical content—remains a complete mystery.

It’s only as the album winds down that we finally get a glimpse of the Angelokos behind the beats and sparkles. The acoustic versions of "Sleepyhead" and "Moth’s Wings" reveal a thoughtful, reflective man with a sweet, soaring voice, while the final track, a cover of The Cranberries’ "Dreams," suggests either a love of early nineties pop or a wicked sense of humour. All this points to one conclusion: we need to hear more from Passion Pit.

Written by: Alice Allan, July 9th 2010

Heartland

admin — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 00:00:00 +0000

By Owen Pallett

Domino Records

Former Final Fantasy mastermind Owen Pallett’s voice is one of my favorites in music right now. On Heartland’s opening song, “Midnight Directives,” it floats alongside the violin lines, reaching high and stretching across the track, taking it in beautiful directions that both fit and conflict beautifully with the insistent drums and electronic elements. The song ends abruptly, and the next, “Keep the Dog Quiet,” begins as abruptly, with a staccato string line and quiet maraca accompaniment.

Heartland is noisier and more electronic than any previous Final Fantasy album, which makes sense given the experimental nature of the project. Pallett wrote Heartland as an opera about a peasant named Lewis, who is ordered by his God (named Owen, no less) to lead a revolt. Pallett posted all the lyrics to Heartland online in October 2009, giving fans months to pour over the poetry of the words before hearing them set to music.

The girl-group inspired melody in “Lewis Takes Action” directly conflicts with the violence in the lyrics: “I took No-Face by his beak and broke his jaw, he’ll never speak again.” “The Great Elsewhere” is a beautiful song that ends in a crisis of faith about “the indifferences of the Storyteller.” Heartland is not only beautiful to listen to, but a joy to unfold and interpret the world Pallett has created in this album.

The album ends with a question: “What Do You Think Will Happen Now?” Pallett absolutely succeeds at keeping the listener thoroughly engaged, but always with that question of marvelous uncertainty. If you like your indie music literary and elusive, Heartland is a challenge and a delight.

Written by: Dana Reinoos, April 8th 2010

Listen

admin — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 08:00:00 +0000

Emanuel and The Fear

Paper Garden Records

Initially, I was put off by Emanuel and The Fear. I didn’t understand their show tunes inspiration, their jaunty piano melodies, and their choral backing. It’s been a long road from the high school show choir stage to the sofa where I sit today, and it took several weeks for Listen to grow on me. Once it did, it was a like a viral infection for which there is no cure.

Emanuel and The Fear sound like some combination of The Mountain Goats meets Bowie meets The Polyphonic Spree meets Hedwig And The Angry Inch. (Throw in some Arcade Fire for good measure.) Epic, sweeping melodies complete with cymbal clashes blend rather comfortably with mostly-spoken lyrics. The album—a neverending musical storytelling exercise if there ever was one—is best played in one steady stream, no skipping tracks, no searching for radio-ready singles. For this reason alone, I can only imagine how amazing Emanuel and The Fear—all eleven of them—are in concert.

Though all the songs fit together seamlessly, “Jimme’s Song” was an immediate favorite with Jimme lamenting, via Emanuel, “I don’t want to do nothing but be in a rock band/I don’t wanna get a job/I don’t wanna be a man.” Thankfully—for me, if not for my partner—this anti-adult sentiment doesn’t describe my ex-boyfriends so much as it describes me. Sometimes I am so freaking pleased that I don’t conform to daily wage slavery in a cubicle; other days, it seems a little too obvious that I am over-educated and under thirty. All I want is a metaphorical rock band—the real one, not that video game fakery—to be my job, to pay the bills. Instead, I review albums. We all make compromises.

Similarly, “Free Life” speaks to the ways you can take control of your own destiny. “It’s a free life if you live it/Why not give it a try.” For all the unfortunate things I have been in my life, the worst thing I’ve ever been was confined.

“Same Way” also speaks to my romantic-but-partnered heart—as if one supersedes the other. To no one’s surprise, I am the downer half of the couple, the misanthrope who cries for no reason and will never be satisfied with my own twisted version of “success.” Just the other night, I was actively frowning (not that I noticed), and my partner leaned over to look at my glum face. “It’s really hard,” he said with total sympathy.” “What is?” I asked. “To be happy.”

How you can’t seem to be happy
Unless you’re making some poor girl feel the same
But I don’t wanna be that way
So if you gotta leave me babe
I won’t say anything

With an impressively generous nineteen songs on one album, Emanuel and The Fear remind me of all the reasons I fell in love with the total album experience as a youngster. Catch them on tour this spring and tell me how much you loved the show.

Written by: Brittany Shoot, March 26th 2010

– Sainthood

admin — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 01:00:00 +0000

Tegan and Sara

Sire/Warner

The poised, charismatic sisters that make up the indie power-pop twosome Tegan and Sara always seem to be a step ahead of their game. Their music blends pop alt-rock with healthy dose of just what pop needs, integrity and passion. And then there’s that little spark that only a handful of bands have that makes them stand apart from the rest.

They know their fans—what they wear, what they eat and what they want. That being said, these H&M-wearing, pint-sized dedicated minions should be pleased with Tegan and Sara’s newest effort, Sainthood, a perfect milestone to document their progression as songwriters and their well-deserved rise to mini-stardom. Partially recorded at Sound City Studios, laid down amidst the superlative rock remnants of Nirvana’s Nevermind, Rage Against the Machine’s self-titled debut, and Tool’s Undertow to name a few, the record is a seasoned combination of pop-punk, new wave inspired tunes with catchy electro elements.

Although the image, artwork and an unparalleled connection to fans are a huge factor, it simply comes down to good songs and Tegan and Sara’s music tends to deliver without any sense of narcissism and entitlement. Their lyrics strike a nerve and could read like journal entries, allowing the uber fan to absolve deeper and deeper into the artist’s trance. And surely they’d drink the Kool-Aid if asked.

The opener is like that first page of a book—so good it convinces you to turn the page and keep going—grabbing the listener while setting the tone for each track thereafter. “Arrow” does just that, subliminally painting the cover art and colorful inserts within the first notes. Gratifyingly quirky and energetic, Sara delivers the lyrics staccato with a new wave backbeat that picks up speed as it builds until it’s released into a fun, loose power-pop anthem.

The album’s first single “Hell,” is a liberating ode to letting go and showcases Tegan’s traditional guitar-driven chops with help from heavy new wave power chords and cathartic lyrics, “When we get up and over it and over them!” “Northshore” is reminiscent of a Ramones classic clocking in at two minutes with simple lyrics, yet randomly descriptive and delivered effortlessly on a super speedy loop. “Something’s so sick about this my misery’s so addictive…” “Northshore” definitely wins as one of the catchiest and most addictive tracks on the record. “Red Belt” embraces Sara’s meticulous approach to the unconventional pop song. Its slow tempo and simple execution proves how brilliant simplicity can be.

In “Alligator” Sara’s voice displays soul fused pop and channels some classic R&B as the bright keyboard tinkering bounces with added distortion laid atop for affect. Her voice compliments the track perfectly, with her ‘60s teen pop vocals reminiscent of a young Ronnie Spector or Lesley Gore. “The Ocean”, is a bona fide crowd pleaser, catchy from start to finish. The melodic elements in the bridge preceding the impassioned lyrics, “All around me new love and it makes me sad all around me feel assured that you'll be back if I imagine your body next to another,” all ebbs and flow together, with the title lending itself as the perfect (possible) metaphor.

Sainthood is pure infectious indie-pop that has you chanting the lyrics in your head while feeling the beats pop internally after the first listen, but without neglecting the edginess and sincerity that sets it apart. Something truly thought provoking and interesting has been birthed yet again, but this baby is wiser and a bit more refined than its respectable siblings.

Written by: Cat Veit, December 10th 2009

Songs for Tuesdays

admin — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 23:43:00 +0000

By Summer Cats

Slumberland Records

As their name implies, Australia’s Summer Cats' new full length Songs for Tuesdays is full of catchy, sweet melodies that are reminiscent of beach weather. Thankfully, however, the Summer Cats are not too sweet for their own good and the record packs a pleasantly noisy punch and showcases occasional fuzzed-out feedback squeak.

With their chirpy vocal lines, crunchy rhythm guitars, melodies full of jangle, and pounding drums the Summer Cats recall the hey-day of 1990s indie pop. Outfits such as Talulah Gosh, Black Tambourine, and Henry’s Dress immediately come to mind, especially on tracks such as “Let’s Go!,” “Fulton Gurls,” “In June,” and “Paperweight.” It’s fitting, then, that Songs for Tuesdays is released on the newly revived Slumberland, which released similar bands in the 1990s.

Like many indie bands with similar tastes, the Summer Cats’ sound also reaches further back. Careful listeners can pick out references to sound and scene defining bands from Australia and New Zealand, such as The Go-Betweens and The Chills. The Summer Cats lyrics relish life’s simple pleasures, a tendency particularly evident on songs such as “Waking Up.” They also revel in the tendency of modern young people to travel, or dream of traveling, singing “I could be anywhere, anywhere but here,” on “St. Tropez.”

With a full sound that bounces and bubbles along and never looses energy, Songs for Tuesdays is a solid pop record and a pleasure to listen to. In addition, Summer Cats paid close attention to the album’s design. The cover is wallpapered with images of hand-painted birds. In an age of digital downloads, this is a record worth buying.

Written by: Eleanor Whitney, October 13th 2009