Illuminati Hotties – Power [Hopeless 2024]
More difficult because it subverts expectations, Sarah Tudzin’s follow-up to her breakthrough is also much quieter and more ruminative. Her mother’s death, the subsequent workaholism that arose as a form of denial, and her (now) wife’s ability to change Tudzin’s life by slowing down and not putting up with her emotionally repressive bullshit are the main topics. Weepers like “Power” and the showstopper “Rot” go up against the regular power pop of “Didn’t” and “What’s the Fuzz” – the only two featuring outside musicians mind you and none of which up the tempo from ‘moderate’. The layering and textural composition are gorgeous-yet-subtle and require a close ear to appreciate, but its vulnerability is admirable. 3.8/5
MJ Lenderman – Manning Fireworks [Anti-/Epitaph 2024]
The best joke this white indie It boy of the week tells on his Catholic breakup album is the one where he makes you listen to useless noise for 7 minutes at the end. 3.5/5
(“You Don’t Know The Shape I’m In”, “She’s Leaving You”)
Fontaines D.C. – Romance [XL 2024]
Skinty Fia was a breakup album alright, saying goodbye to Dublin for London’s already built out media apparatus is the kind of decision that would make any Irish nationalist put his fist through a wall. Capitalism humbles us all, eh? Especially when the pivot is to an accessible 90’s blend of sounds which I see more as a coping mechanism than a risk. Who amongst us hasn’t at this point re-visited a TV show from childhood for comfort during these uncertain and vocally oppressive times? The lads are consummate professionals though, no other band amongst this wave of U.K. + Irish post punk that they reject inclusion into could make this pivot sound so good even if it feels like a side of fries musically – tasty not nutritious. Nostalgia however has built in reactionary tendencies; “I don’t feel anything in the modern world” might capture a feeling but “Life ain’t always empty” is morally correct as a counter to fascistic force. 3.7/5
Being Dead – EELS [Bayonet 2024]
I can’t say that they’re for everyone. Falcon Bitch (her) and the recently renamed Shmoofy (him) are maybe too cute and definitely too stuck in their 70’s garage/psych aesthetic to win the masses over, which is a shame because they’re exciting to watch and listen to. Neither possess particularly outstanding vocals or instrumental chops but both know exactly how to construct the kind of compelling three-minute guitar song that is always greater than the sum of its parts because both know just the right note to hit and just the right sound to program in. Their greatest strengths are their love of melodies – peep their mastery of dueling vocals on “Van Goes”, the latest in a long line of successful Work Sucks songs – harmonies, and the kind of warm laid-back ebullience that you’d get from the most senior employee at your local REI. Which isn’t to say they’re one dimensional, the inaugural address is an ode to monster fucking and the close out is a love letter to their audience after all. 4.3/5
The Mountain Goats – We Shall All Be Healed [4AD 2004]
I’m too far removed and too impressed by John Darnielle’s skill as a band leader to give a shit about his shift from fictional character study solo act filtered through a defective boombox into “normal fidelity” singer-songwriter the way that his hardcore 90s fans did around the time of this treatise on meth heads’ ability to create community and function within it. Again and again, he’s a master of meticulously detailed language to conjure images; adjectives and verbs that place a listener at the heart of their narrators’ actions with an emphasis on neuroses and justification for bad intention (Post-Tony Soprano Anti-Hero, is that you?). The subliminal has no place here, and why should it with a voice that loud and a backing band this dedicated to the craft of quite literally barding in order to spin legend of people who don’t actually exist, but might if they hear themselves in the song. “Here they come” he cheers, “the young thousands”. 4.2/5
Tyler the Creator – CHROMAKOPIA [Columbia 2024]
I think what was never really investigated at their inception was that Odd Future – well, the ones who mattered anyway – were art school kids by nature. Edgelord personas covering up for emotional wounds, a focus on fashion, and collective building are pre-requisites to get in, anyway. Now seven years after mostly jettisoning his own vitriolic please-give-me-the-attention-my-dad-never-did tendencies, Tyler Okonma’s finally grown into his role as a stable and reliable music maker whose sense of himself informs subject matter without overwhelming. It’s not that his topics have veered that far off course – a queer moment here, a girl song there, a dash of daddy issues, “I’m the shit”—but that by granting extra hooks and an empathetic viewpoint he deepens instead of widens his substantive argument for being as popular as he is. Something like the goofiness of “Sticky” can now compliment the good-natured insatiability of “Darling, I” and radio drama of “Hey Jane” instead of coarsely causing tonal whiplash or blending into one sentimental mush, both of which he’s been guilty of before. Similarly, his conceptualism had previously given him focus but at the cost of boxing in his work, so MF DOOM cover art aside this is a song collection with a throughline instead of a narrative or homage as has been his m.o. and the better for it in my eyes. 4.2/5
Cosmic Hero 