Blogcritics Category: Music: New Wave

Music Review: Kaiser Chiefs - Off With Their Heads

Anthony Tobis — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 22:21:07 EST

Kaiser Chiefs have created a pop masterpiece that pushes the boundaries of the genre into new sonic territory.
Kaiser Chiefs' third offering, Off With Their Heads, is nothing short of Britpop bliss. While countless critics will undoubtedly shower this record with endless comparisons to the typical cast of British stalwarts (think the Stone Roses, The Kinks, The Jam, etc.) -- and truly those influences are evident -- the intrinsic value of this record...

Music Review: Martha & The Muffins - Danseparc

Jade Blackmore — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 18:40:04 EDT

This remastered edition reinforces Martha & the Muffins' place as one of the most innovative new wave bands.
Danseparc by Martha & the Muffins — or M & M, as they are sometimes called — is one of those quietly heralded new wave albums that misses most top-of-the-decade lists, but remains a favorite with die-hard music buffs. Martha & the Muffins gained fame with their frothy dance hit “Echo Beach,” but M &...

Music Review: Tom Verlaine - Dreamtime and Words from the Front

Bill Sherman — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 22:19:25 EDT

Two of the former Television front man's early solo albums get much-needed reissues.
Of all the major bands to come out of the CBGBs Era, it was Television who remain arguably the least fully appreciated. Despite releasing two magnificent albums of guitar-driven art-punk (Marquee Moon and Adventure), the New York band never passed into the MTV circle of their peers in Talking Heads or Blondie, for instance. Perhaps lead...

Music Review: Kevin Locke - Earth Gift

Richard Marcus — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 16:59:49 EDT

There is no denying that Kevin Locke is a highly proficient flute player, this recording doesn't bring anything new to the instruments repertoire.
It was sometime in the early 1990s when the rest of the world discovered, much the way Columbus discovered America, that there was more to traditional Native American music than just drums. However, they quickly made up for lost time and since then the cedar flute, sometimes known as a love flute as it had been primarily used by young men for...

Music Review: The Gun Club - Fire of Love

Andy Peterson — Tue, 7 Oct 2008 22:52:45 EDT

Seminal punk-garage which Jack White clearly has on repeat...
Recorded in New Orleans in just six speed fuelled days (allegedly for less than $2,000), The Gun Club’s unsettling, inspirational debut supposedly had Jack White fixated by its gut wrenching howl. Driven/Sermonized by quixotic frontman Jeffrey Lee Pierce, Fire of Love is a bite from the shit sandwich of his visceral world, in which the lines...

Concert Review: Billy Idol - Hollywood, California, September 17, 2008

tink — Sat, 4 Oct 2008 20:41:02 EDT

Call this Billy anything but idle!
North on the 101 Freeway past the Capitol Records building, exit down Highland past the Hollywood Bowl, onto Sunset Boulevard in front of Hollywood High School. With each passing mile, the klieg lights that swept the sky became more distinct as my course for the night neared... a visual X marked the spot on the treasure map. Destination: the House...

Music Review: Martha And The Muffins - Danseparc

Richard Marcus — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 21:18:32 EDT

Martha And The Muffins wedded the energy of punk with technology and subtle intelligence.
There was a bad, and slightly disparaging, joke that circulated in the late 1970s early 1980s that asked how you could tell the difference between someone who was into punk and someone who was into new wave. The answer was that punks stuck safety pins in their flesh and new wavers wore pins of their favourite band's name pinned to their...

Music Review: Architecture in Helsinki - Like It Or Not

Mark Kalriess — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 07:37:13 EDT

An indie rock group makes a great dance record.
Architecture in Helsinki has always been a hard band to describe. On their first album their sound consisted of whispery vocals, droning synths, and short horn bursts over simple traditional band instrumentation. Since then, they have progressively upped the tempo with each release and replaced the whispery style with more of a sing/shout one. ...

Music Review: Pacific! - Reveries

Bill Sherman — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 16:05:07 EDT

A Swedish studio duo's American debut -- electro-pop with one foot in the seventies.
The stateside debut of a two-man Swedish pop group, Pacific!'s Reveries (EMI) works hard to live up to its connotative group name. No less than three songs contain the word "sun" in their title, and if we don't see "beach" anywhere on the track list, at least one of the tracks takes us "poolside." The...

Music Review - Okkervil River - The Stand Ins

Eric Whelchel — Tue, 9 Sep 2008 13:38:40 EDT

Okkervil River's latest album is heavy on the dark stuff - and that's a good thing.
Essentially a sequel to 2007’s The Stage Names, which was briefly considered for release as a two-disc album before being scaled down to a single album, Okkervil River's The Stand Ins uses central images of musicians and life on the stage to again address many of the themes that first surfaced on the band's 2007 album. Such a back...