Category: Albums

Mariion Christiian, “Still Water” / “The Weight of Things” (EMG Records)

You’d file this new EP somewhere between Above & Beyond and Tiesto, and yes, it’s that good. Christian is known as a veteran producer who has a way with melodies that “articulate emotions in a way that words simply cannot,” which was evident on his 2022 “Bleu EP,” but it does come into sharper focus on this new release, where you’re never quite sure where the beat’s going to shift to next, but it’s singularly pleasant. The Los Angeles-based producer is big on brevity at this point, obviously; he’s more into afterparty vibe as opposed to club bangers and such. “Still Water” has a 1980s feel to it, but it’s steeped in the sort of bright, sparkly stuff you may have raved to back in the day; “The Weight of Things” is more on the Aphex Twin/Orbital side, soaring with soprano samples and a shuffling rhythm that’s pretty irresistible really. He’s been known to doof around with sub-tribal stuff reminiscent of Tangerine Dream; it’ll be interesting to see what he does next. A+

Will Butler + Sister Squares, Will Butler + Sister Squares (Merge Records)

This Butler isn’t the one who basically ruined Arcade Fire by getting in very hot water by racking up some sexual harassment charges. That’s Win, not Will; Will is Win’s younger brother, who’s teamed up here with Sister Squares, a group of four peeps with backgrounds in classical music, Broadway (Sara Dobbs had a run as Anybodys in West Side Story), choreography and such, and one of them is Will’s wife. This album opens with a mopey intro, then launches into “Stop Talking,” which could pass for an unreleased, too electro-sounding single by the Tubes (please tell me someone out there remembers those guys). “Willows” is jangly cowboy-hat indie, tuneful in its way; “Me And My Friends” has some goth-stompiness to it; “Arrow Of Time” is a campy nod to Flaming Lips, and so on and so forth. This really isn’t bad at all, and seeing that Arcade Fire is sinking fast, with bands dropping out of their tours, it’s a smart move on Butler’s part, not for nothin’. A-

Playlist

• On to the new CD releases for Aug. 25, folks, up and at ’em, let’s do this, don’t give me that face, and now for a special message. If you’re a Facebook Friend of mine, you know that I’m trying to get on Fritz Wetherbee’s show on WMUR TV’s New Hampshire Chronicle, a show in which Fritz, between costume changes to adjust the color and raw awesomeness of his bow tie du jour, talks to you, the audience who’s sitting there eating leftover KFC, about how this or that super-small town in our beloved Granite State was once visited by Gen. George Washington, whoever that is, and someone who was probably French once invented a device to milk goats or whatnot and got rich, which led to his being tried and hung as a warlock. Anyway, I expect I’ll get a message from Fritz any day now, begging me to come on, and I want to be musically prepared with the right tunes for my visit, so that he won’t freak out that I don’t only listen to scratchy 1920s Ray Noble records and kick me off his show! No, I seriously do want to be the next Fritz; if Fritz ever decides he has had it, I would be glad to take over his show.

In the meantime I’m trying to find some music to talk about in this week’s column, some dulcet tunes that’ll prove to Fritz that I should be the new Fritz, on TV, talking about goat witches and etc., so hey, everyone, remember to help spread the hashtag #MakeSaegerTheNewFritz whenever you post to your favorite social media hellscape.

OK, I did take a gander at the new releases coming out on the 25th, and there was nothing about driving around with Petunia in a Model T, but wouldn’t you know it, there’s a new album coming out that day from old-time American bluegrass/string-band throwbacks Old Crow Medicine Show! Titled Jubilee, it features the song “Miles Away,” a folksy bluegrass-gasm that perfectly fits all the song’s video’s scenery of random wooden bridges in places that remind me of Spofford Lake, N.H., which would be a great place for Fritz and me to visit when we shoot our first episode of the show, driving around in an original vintage Stanley Steamer, just waving at the locals who’ve never seen an automobile before. Remember to use that hashtag, folks, let’s make this happen, I’m 100 percent serious about this.

• Let’s see, what else have we here — blah blah blah, whatever — OK, wait, Fritz will dig this, I’m sure he used to get crazy to Alice Cooper albums on eight-track back in the days, when he was in college with all the wacky weed and such, and look, gang, Alice has a new album coming out right now, called Road! The first single is titled “I’m Alice,” and it sounds a little like “Elected,” but then again, what Alice Cooper song doesn’t? There’s some fiddle in there too, and if I’m chosen to become the new Fritz, it will be the theme song for my New Hampshire Chronicle segments, the first of which will cover my investigation of the town of Stewartstown, N.H., which is so close to Canada that you can practically taste the maple-flavored poutine!

• Fritz would probably like North Carolina band Hiss Golden Messenger, because it too is indie-folk and country. The quintet’s new LP, Jump For Joy, wields the single “Shinbone,” a mellow, woozy track that sounds like a drunk Tom Petty.

• Lastly, it’s B-52s singer Cindy Wilson, with an album called Realms. The single, “Midnight,” is Berlin-ish ’80s-krautrock-dance. It’s OK, and don’t forget the hashtag #MakeSaegerTheNewFritz, folks!

If you’re in a local band, now’s a great time to let me know about your EP, your single, whatever’s on your mind. Let me know how you’re holding yourself together without being able to play shows or jam with your homies. Send a recipe for keema matar. Message me on Twitter (@esaeger) or Facebook (eric.saeger.9).

Bluphoria, Bluphoria (Edgeout Records/UMe)

I’m late to the ball by a couple of months on this one, the debut LP from this northern California-based alt-rock band, whose guitarist/frontman Reign LaFreniere is a Black dude who grew up on stuff like Hendrix, Dylan, James Brown, Pink Floyd and whatnot; he’s all about retaking the hard-ish-rock genre back to its roots, and for that he should be thanked, sort of, I suppose. Produced by Mark Needham (Imagine Dragons, Mt. Joy, The 1975, others), it’s a mixed bag of throwback-bar-band-microwaving. Opener “Set Me Up” is blatantly ’80s, a kissin’ cousin to Greg Kihn’s “The Break Up Song” with a Lenny Kravitz buzz to it (not reaching for the handiest reference there, either, it just is); “Believe in Love” is a cross between dance-floor Prince and the main theme from Footloose. Harmless, idiotic fun throughout. The closest they’ll come to New Hampshire during their current tour is the Middle East Upstairs in Cambridge, Mass., on Nov. 9. B

James Rivera’s Metal Wave, New Wave Gone Metal (Massacre Records)

In “am I the only one who thinks the ’80s rebirth has overstayed its welcome” news, this is a project from former Helstar singer Rivera, 10 New Wave tunes re-rubbed as hair-metal versions, and the only really interesting thing about this, to me anyway, is the fact that no one’s done it before, unless they have, not that I want to find out. OK, strike that, be nice Saeger, the concept does work in some of the tries, for instance the rub of Bauhaus’s “Bela Lugosi’s Dead”; I always thought the original version was kind of lumpy and dumb, and some Ozzy-style guitar definitely breathes new life into it, even if Rivera’s campy vocals border on Weird Al level. Wasn’t a big fan of the version of The Ramones’ “Pet Sematary,” being that the original track was fine; same goes for the Cure’s “Love Song.” The band’s take on Tears For Fears’ “Everybody Wants To Rule The World” is so well-deservedly awful toward a Mercyful Fate manner that it’s the best on board. A hearty “meh” to this. B-

Playlist

• I haven’t trawled through this week’s list of new CD releases that can only be found on the top-secret list we professional music journos consult when we put on our nappy fez hats and begin writing our edgy newspaper columns (psst, Amazon.com is the most reliable place, really, but we always tell readers we use Metacritic, just so you’ll think we’re actual wizards), so I don’t yet know what rock ’n’ roll albums are coming out this Friday, Aug. 18. There’s a reason for my telling you all this; it’s because I predict that a holiday album will be in the list, being that Christmas is so close (anyone have some liquid nitrogen I could spray on myself to get a little relief from all the insane heat?), so let’s have at it, let’s look at the list and see who’s going to be the first dumb band/artiste to take the plunge this year and try to impress us rock journos with their polite renditions of “O Holy Night” and whatever, even though, ironically enough, said band/artiste is most famous for “having beefs” and/or getting arrested and publicly canceled for some totally Christmas-y act of sexual depravity or etc., let me go take a gander here, dum de dum — Ack! Ack! I win, and I’m not kidding, I hadn’t looked at the list yet: It’s actress/singer Renee Rapp, who plays Leighton Murray in the HBO Max series The Sex Lives of College Girls, with an album called Snow Angel! The title track has a happy-gloom-chill feel to it, like Lana Del Rey, except Rapp’s singing is more gimmicky/interesting than that, sort of yodel-y. OK, it’s not a hardcore Christmas tune, but it is definitely Christmas-minded, toward a calculated, corporate fashion, because the lyrics don’t include words like “Christmas tree” or “Kringle,” but there are references to frozen noses and boyfriends, so tough noogies, guys, I’m calling it, I win, so let’s hop on Yukon Cornelius’ North Pole sleigh and go be Christmas-y and independent together! Wahoooo!

• Oh, look, the guys in the garage-punk band originally named Orinoka Crash Suite have changed the band’s name again, this time to Osees! Actually, I’m a day late and a dollar short or something, because their new album, Intercepted Message, is their fourth one released under the new moniker, isn’t it the best when bands change their names and you have to spend a good 10 percent of your column explaining that to your readers instead of describing their music? I sure do, and I probably went over this whole sordid story the last time I talked about them in this space, but we’re almost out of room for talking about this new LP, so what say we take a listen to the new single, “Stunner!” OK, it’s a cross between Flaming Lips and Primus, more or less, “boasting” a bunch of whirring space-guitar-noise and vocals that are in the Captain Beefheart realm, which means — oh, whatever, I’m not going to try to get pedagogic about this nonsense, it’s a joke song, whatever, let’s move this along.

• The three dudes from The Xcerts are originally from Scotland, but now they want to be called a British band because they moved to England. Kind of sad, isn’t it? They were around 13 years old when they first formed the band, and their upcoming fourth LP is Learning How To Live And Let Go. One of the tunes, “Blame,” has some art-rock guitar to it, but the vocals are pretty Weezer-ish, if your stomach could tolerate something of that ilk.

• We’ll call it a wrap with New York City-based rocker Margaret Glaspy, whose new album, Echo The Diamond, is on the way, spearheaded by the single “Act Natural,” which features Glaspy doing a Kate Havnevik warble over a rudimentary guitar riff. Not much to say about this one really.

If you’re in a local band, now’s a great time to let me know about your EP, your single, whatever’s on your mind. Let me know how you’re holding yourself together without being able to play shows or jam with your homies. Send a recipe for keema matar. Message me on Twitter (@esaeger) or Facebook (eric.saeger.9).

Huey Lewis & The News, Sports [vinyl reissue] (Capitol Records)

I know right, 40 years late, but hey man, this is an actual reissue on vinyl, and another notable aspect of this occasion is the fact that I’ve never reviewed a Huey Lewis record, unless I have, but I doubt it. Anyway, Lewis’ pull quote from the press release for this one goes, “In the early ’80s, there was no internet, no alternative scene, and really only one avenue to success; a hit single on CHR (Contemporary Hit Radio)” and blah blah blah, out of touch much, and plus some nonsense about the band producing this album themselves and such, which I don’t believe for a millisecond, but at any rate, for the benefit of all the millennials I see grumbling on social media about how much better the ’80s were, this album is solid proof that they weren’t, because you had to hear this album’s singles everywhere you went on this planet, from the beep-beep dingbat-pop megahit “Heart Of Rock n Roll” and its evil twin, “I Want a New Drug” to the mindless heavy rock-riffed “Heart and Soul” and the doo-wop pandering of “If This Is It.” So, young folks, if you want to know what 1985 sounded like, it was this: If you weren’t being subjected to the eleventy-zillionth listen of one of the singles from Michael Jackson’s Thriller (the only album to beat this one, sales-wise, that year), it was one of these monstrosities, so really, count your blessings. B

Girlschool, WTFortyfive? (Silver Lining Music)

No, the titular “forty-five” here doesn’t reference Donald Trump, it’s a reminder that this British all-female heavy metal band has been at it for 45 years, exhibiting a knack for technical-enough riffing of a Judas Priest-ish bent all the while, meaning that they’re better musicians than the guys in, say, Saxon, for example, which isn’t supposed to matter anyway in this era of so-called “another politics,” in which activists and such are expected to stop disrespecting others based on anachronistic power levels and whatnot, in other words it doesn’t really matter whether it’s a guy or a girl shredding on guitar, it just is. A noble thing, that, but opening tune “It Is What It Is” is the most generic ’80s-metal track I’ve heard since the entire B-side of the original Fright Night soundtrack. “Cold Dark Heart” is cool, though, a grinder about vampires I think, but, in a move to negate any credibility they could have attained otherwise, the band brought in Saxon frontman Biff Byford to holler a few syllables in the tosser “Born To Raise Hell.” Ah well. B

Playlist

• Aug. 11 is a Friday, which is as good an excuse as any for bands and artistes to put out albums, like the ones we will discuss today in this multiple-award-winning column! I haven’t won an award for my in-depth music journalism since 2007 or thereabouts, so if any reader out there is up for handing out an award, I’d be glad to hear from you, but what would be even better would be someone from New Hampshire Chronicle getting in touch with me for a long-overdue interview; I’d be glad to talk to them and discuss my decades as a rock journalist, especially if it meant that I’d get the chance to maybe run into Fritz Wetherbee at the WMUR snack machine and “totally accidentally” touch his awesome bow tie, and maybe chat with him about my adventures hunting antiques in Warren, N.H., and all the chickens that run around loose in the town, anecdotes I’d gladly allow him to use on his show! With regard to what new rock ‘n’ roll albums I’d suggest Fritz listen to, it’s hard to say, because if he insists on listening to proven great music like Jerry Lee Lewis and Bo Diddley, there’s not much I could offer the esteemed Nashuan this week aside from the latest record from The Hives, The Death Of Randy Fitzsimmons! The Hives are, of course, one of the few bands born during the aughts that’s worth even listening to, mostly because, hey, imagine five Swedish dudes who think they’re Jerry Lee Lewis, or the guy from The Cramps, or whichever. Honestly if Fritz and I were at the beach enjoying some cheap beach-stand chop suey right now, I would play the new single from this album, “Bogus Operandi,” in the car, and just crank it until he started bobbing his head over its post-Black Flag punkness. It’d be rad, and then we’d talk about all the ghosts and chickens he’s encountered in our beloved Granite State.

• Ha ha, speaking of Johnny Rotten and whatever, someone tell Fritz Wetherbee that Public Image Ltd. has a new album coming out this Friday, titled End Of World! Boy, I’ll bet my homeboy Fritz would suddenly find his bow tie spinning around like a cartoon Elmer Fudd pinwheel if he heard this new single, “Car Chase,” because it’s a combination of ’80s krautrock and Ozzy Osbourne, sort of, and Johnny’s voice is cracking worse and worse every minute, which actually makes it cool.

• Ack, it’s a day that ends in ‘y,’ so there’s another Neil Young album for me to deal with. Chrome Dreams was supposed to be released in 1977, but it wasn’t. Or not, it seems like YouTube has plenty of video versions of the gentle, breezy, strummy snore-along “Will to Love,” a song that’s decent enough but doesn’t go much of anyplace, not that that’s ever been part of the plan with that dude. Aside from “Ohio” and “Southern Man” I guess. Oh, forget it. Next.

• We’ll end with indie-whatever stalwart Bonnie Prince Billy, who has a new album, Keeping Secrets Will Destroy You, coming out in like 10 or 15 minutes! One of the songs is “She Is My Everything,” and in it he sounds like an off-key Peabo Bryson, and he’s singing over a folk guitar, and then he adds some oboe to make it completely unpalatable. I love all the hot new music jams, folks!

If you’re in a local band, now’s a great time to let me know about your EP, your single, whatever’s on your mind. Let me know how you’re holding yourself together without being able to play shows or jam with your homies. Send a recipe for keema matar. Message me on Twitter (@esaeger) or Facebook (eric.saeger.9).

Babychaos, “Guilty Hands (I Bleed)” (self-released)

Initial single heralding a fast-forthcoming EP from this eye-rollingly edgy goth chick, who, like Poppy (and you’ve already forgotten how awesome Poppy is, or at least was, I’ll bet), is Boston-based (this girl won the Metal Artist of the Year award at the 2022 Boston Music Awards), has a lot of gross slasher-movie stuff in her videos (Poppy wanted to be a one-woman Meshuggah before she foolishly abandoned that ship in a rush), has a lot of tattoos (I think Poppy’s are fake) and is a big social media influencer. Does that automatically make her interesting or important? No, it does not, but it might inspire some to become entranced by her siren song (she’s from Salem, Mass., by the way!), because — at least going by this single — her trip is part Marilyn Manson and part Evanescence — my stars, look at how edgy she is on this video! OK, may I go now? B

The Mystical Hot Chocolate Endeavors, A Clock Without A Craftsman (Massacre Records)

So I’d just finished up the Babychaos review (somewhere else on this page), and funnily enough Poppy has an album coming out as well, but the only advance I had in hand was a single, but even funnier-ly enough, this prog-rock band is from Boston as well, so let’s give this a whirl. This count-’em 98-minute double album from the four-piece group professed to enjoy dabbling in “everything from ’70s progressive rock, ’90s alternative rock/shoegaze, ’80s New Wave” to blah blah blah, this was a pleasant surprise. It’s tough to nail them down, not because they’re unfocused but because they really are good. A lot of this stuff really soars, toward a middle-of-the-road, aughts-indie-radio fashion: try to picture Nile with a Minus The Bear fetish, or just Minus The Bear, period, but 10 times more technically busy, and that’d be this. Seriously, if you’d be down with a more tech-metal Foo Fighters, this’d fit the bill for you. It’s already on my short list for Underrated Record Of The Year. A+

Playlist

• Oh, no, it’s August already, I am not ready for the summer to end, are you? Of course not, especially because you can be sure that Mother Nature will make up for the limp winter she sent us last year, remember? Yup, I only used the snowblower once, and since all the “snow” was actually just lemon slushie goop that was already half-melted, my indestructible 30-year-old snowblower was all like, “right, you know all I’m going to do is clog and stall, let’s just bag it and take a nap, there, buckaroo, it’ll be melted by morning, relax.” And it was, and what that means is that this winter will be a vengeance-wreaking hellscape of horizontally blowing ice-doom and Abominable Bumble monsters chasing Yukon Cornelius around and eating cars — oh, just tell me when it’s over and I can go have fish on the beach again, won’t you? Where was I, oh, yes, the new albums that are hitting the streets on Aug. 4, that was it. Art School Girlfriend is the pseudonym of Polly Mackey, a producer, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist from Wrexham, North Wales, and her new LP, Soft Landing, is headed this way right now. I just checked out the latest single, “Real Life,” from this music album, and it’s pretty cool if you like a little Portishead vibe with your Goldfrapp-style bedroom techno. It’s pretty somber and depressing overall, but her samples and grooves are quite nice indeed.

• Girl Ray is an all-female indie-rock trio from London, U.K., and look over there, their new album, Prestige, is on the way for delivery to stores this Friday, if there are indeed any record stores still in existence other than the Newbury Comics in Manchvegas, unless even that place stopped selling records and got into the vitamin supplements market. Anyway, this album is quite fascinating, or at least the tire-kicker single “Love Is Enough” certainly is; it leans heavily to a funky, almost progressive vibe a la Red Hot Chili Peppers, but with Lana Del Ray-ish vocals. Hard to picture, I know, right, but trust me on this, it’s impressive.

• Hey, Zoomers, did you know that once upon a time there was a TV show called General Hospital, and it starred this guy Rick Springfield as one of the doctor/model dudes or whatever they are? No, I can see you don’t, and I don’t blame you at all, just suffice to say he was basically the prototype for the Kardashians, except he didn’t know how to apply press-on fingernails, which is, admittedly, an essential survival skill. But whatnot, anyway, Springfield’s new “platter” is Automatic, I’ll bet it sucks beyond belief, let’s go listen to the title track, shaaaall we? Ack, it has a sample composed of unplugged guitar, and it moves really fast; the song sort of rips off Robert Palmer’s “Simply Irresistible.” You’d have to hear it for yourself, let’s move on.

• And finally we have Mammoth WVH, with their new album, Mammoth II. Guess what “WVH” stands for, I’ll bet you’ll never get it, it’s Wolfgang Van Halen, gawd, I miss his dad Eddie so bad, don’t you? Wolfgang plays almost all the instruments on this album, and the first single, “Take A Bow,” sounds like Creed trying to be the Foo Fighters, but take heart, maybe there are other songs on this album that will save the day and preserve Eddie’s legacy, I am not sure at this writing.

If you’re in a local band, now’s a great time to let me know about your EP, your single, whatever’s on your mind. Let me know how you’re holding yourself together without being able to play shows or jam with your homies. Send a recipe for keema matar. Message me on Twitter (@esaeger) or Facebook (eric.saeger.9).

EbE404, Dark Ice Days (Give/Take Records)

It’s not that I’ve been avoiding the goth/industrial promo albums that have been coming in for many months from the Give/Take label; to be honest, the name of the PR company that services the imprint’s stuff is very similar to one of the nyms that a local troll uses when he emails literal gigabytes of punk cartoons to author Matt Taibbi and me, so most of it gets deleted out of hand. As far as the music on this album goes, it’s pretty much a stompy, wordless industrial DJ trip, the first two songs (“Open Water” and “Alchymicus”) sounding almost identical, which I truly hope wasn’t done on purpose; they’re of a Combichrist/darkwave sort, lots of sustained laser bursts, random samples and whatnot, not my cup of tea really but nothing that would keep the latex crowd off the dance floor, I suppose. Things get more interesting with “Bouncing,” in which the artiste(s) dabble in Greater Wrong Of The Right-era Skinny Puppy glitch and bleep-bloop. It’s fine for what it is. B

Styx, Crash Of The Crown (Alpha Dog 2T/UMe Records)

Owing to age and such, midcentury-era arena bands are dropping like flies, or at best, touring around with only one original band member, as is the case with Foghat, which is down to the drummer. Styx, though, comes off as being as spry as Greta Van Fleet, pound for pound; now that they’re pretty much a self-contained unit, with their own record label (and, assuredly, studio and all that), they’re free to be as prog-rock as they like, and this album does go into some pretty busy riffs and things, as evidenced in the opening track, “The Fight Of Our Lives,” which continues their tradition of writing sociopolitically topical lyrics focused on conflicts between the First and Third Estates, but always ending on a positive note (which gets more difficult each year, of course). But as I alluded to, this is more proggy; drummer Todd Sucherman has Neil Peart-level chops, which has to be making the other guys feel really pleased. Probably the band’s best ever, pound for pound. A+

Playlist

• Jane, stop this crazy thing, it’s July 28 already, a Friday, and you know what that means, that’s right, it means there will be a bunch of new albums for you to listen to if you haven’t completely given up on music yet! Look there, the first album off the assembly line is a live album from Sissy Spacek look-alike Joni Mitchell, called Joni Mitchell At Newport! That’s right, Facebook grandmoms, totally live versions of all your favorites from back when everyone lived in log cabins and believed in forest giants and wood nymphs, and — wait, is this the one where — yes, it is, it’s the one where Joni was wheeled out to the Newport Folk Festival as a surprise guest during Brandi Carlisle’s set, and it was so cool, Brandi twerking like a dancehall princess or whatever she usually does, and then they rolled Joni onstage in her ancient scarab-inlaid sarcophagus and Brandi probably ruined a few songs by singing/twerking along to tunes like “Big Yellow Taxi,” “Shine,” “Help Me” and “Come In From the Cold” and whatever, “Both Sides Now” and all those other super-old melodies that, when the grandmothers put their Joni cassettes in the boombox at the backyard barbecue, it’s the cue for us males immediately to gather together, pretending not to hear them or our wives or dates, while we form a big awkward man-circle, sizing each other up just like our Neanderthal ancestors, cheap smelly American lagers in hand, talking about installing random shelves in our garages or the skyrocketing price of Viagra and all the usual man stuff. And so all those tunes will be on this disc, remember to buy this album so that Joni can get even more ridiculously rich, you owe it to ’Murica as a citizen.

• If you’ve spent any time within earshot of the overhead speakers in a Target electronics department you know of Post Malone, the Syracuse, N.Y., singer/sort-of-rapper who’s essentially a more Disney-fied version of The Weeknd, doesn’t that sound goooood? Whatever, he’s got no beef with any corporate hip-hop fraudster that I’m aware of, so I’m already fighting to stay awake writing anything about him at all, but suffice to say that his new album is called Austin, and the title track is OK if you like his usual brand of post-Drake bedroom-trap-chill and have a tolerance for Auto-Tune and grillz and all the other cutting-edge cultural touchstones Malone figures he should zzzzzzzzzzzz

• Ack, I fell asleep, sorry, guys, and look who’s here, it’s Florida nu-metal wannabes Sevendust, with a sizzlin’ new album titled Truth Killer! You know, I interviewed these guys once, way back, for the Village Voice family of newspapers, and they were probably the nicest, least egotistical fellas I encountered back in those days, so hopefully they’re still a decent-enough band and still making tolerable if not terribly inventive hard rock so that I don’t have to bring down the thunder and bum them out in today’s column, you know how it goes! OK, wait, I am now broadcasting live from YouTube, where I’m watching the video for the band’s new song “Everything,” and it’s pretty decent, like Living Colour but heavier. They always did sound like Living Colour, of course, but now they sound like an even angrier derivative act!

• And finally we have London-based indie pop band The Clientele, with a new LP titled I Am Not There Anymore! They’ve released albums on Merge Records (including this one if I’m not mistaken) and that always means one thing: the reverb level is cranked to 11, which automatically makes this band awesome. The single, “Blue Over Blue” is like a cross between Beck and Belle & Sebastian, not anything I’d ever listen to in the car, but it’s fine, you have my permission to listen to it wherever you like.

If you’re in a local band, now’s a great time to let me know about your EP, your single, whatever’s on your mind. Let me know how you’re holding yourself together without being able to play shows or jam with your homies. Send a recipe for keema matar. Message me on Twitter (@esaeger) or Facebook (eric.saeger.9).

Fay Victor, Blackity Black Black Is Beautiful (Northern Spy Records)

This record is definitely in the same church if not the same pew as most slam poetry, and while I’m at this, if you’ve had the slightest interest in the ongoing saga involving my attending a Slam Free Or Die slam poetry event here in Manchester, I’m happy to say that the show’s organizer, Christopher Clauss, contacted me the other day and I’m hoping to get to their next show on Aug. 3, which will feature Chicago veteran slam poet Billy Tuggle. As for this album, it’s the Brooklyn-based composer’s first solo record in a thus-far 30-year career whose highlights have included distinguished prize awards, lots of performances in museums, jazz festivals and the like. Her trip is layering her own spoken word poetry and melodic soul/gospel vocalizations over techno, glitch, acid jazz, more glitch and various other beats, her lyrics intended to raise awareness about the things and public figures she holds dear (“Governorship/Senate” is dedicated to Stacey Abrams; the spooky-bizarre “Trust The Universe” to Sun Ra). Fascinating urban art piece, all told. A

Bloodstrings, Heartache Radio (Dackelton Records)

This one had me at “horror psychobilly” but even more so when I noticed they’re Germans. If anyone knows how to conjure drunken, boneheaded American-style punk aggression, it’s Europeans, especially when they’re from countries that aren’t France. This lot have been around since 2009 and mostly did a lusty Ramones-goth thing until the present, which finds the poor dears feeling reflective after losing a few friends to depression and such, which is always horrible, and so, instead of singing about cartoonish fantasy demons, the demons examined in this record are the real ones, for instance the demons of addiction in “The Bottle Talking,” a great little punker that sounds like No Doubt-era Gwen Stefani fronting Hole. The production here is absolutely sparkling, totally pro level, which makes the deranged thrasher “Colorblind” sound like the Runaways on a Green Day budget. Not a lot of punkabilly here, just nicely rendered hardcore for the most part, but there’s nothing wrong with that of course. A

Playlist

• Ack, I hate it, look, the next CD-release Friday is July 21, summer’s already more than half gone, where’s my confounded snowshoes? Ack, but it’s even worse, because look fam, it’s depleted-soil Led Zeppelin wannabes Greta Van Fleet, with their latest album of Zeppelin IV ripoff songs, Starcatcher! I saw a recent YouTube “reaction-style” video where some 20-year-old dude was, he swore, listening to Zep’s “Whole Lotta Love” for the first time, and he was surprised at how much he liked it. Like all olds, it’s impossible for me to believe that someone’s never heard that boring old tune before, but remember, fellow olds, these kids today aren’t listening to 50-year-old songs when they make out in their moms’ Toyota Camrys, they’ve got all kinds of commercial hip-hop and K-pop and Weeknd and Kings Of Leon songs on little thumb drives, and because of that, they don’t tune mom’s car radio away from NPR’s Marketplace or Sirius’s 80s On 8, and because of that, mom has no idea how vacuous and wimpy and empty their preferred music is, and that’s good, because you know what that is? It’s teenage rebellion, folks, kids exercising their right not to listen to Led Zeppelin and Def Leppard until they’re older, saving up all that “good stuff” until they’re old enough to appreciate it, so they can make reaction YouTubes and then immediately go back to listening to their Bruno Mars and Lorde “oldies records” and never have to listen to that old blues-metal nonsense again. See, kids today are smart; they know that Led Zeppelin is actual devil music, direct from H-E-double-toothpicks, and if they’re not careful, they’ll get sucked into the same Evil Dead time-space vortex that the guys in Greta Van Fleet did, which caused those dummies to try to rewrite Zep’s “Black Dog” every album until they get it sounding better than the original, which they obviously can’t, but look how hard they try! Anyway meanwhile, back at the column, the Fleets have graced us with a new song called “Meeting The Master,” and it’s basically Zep’s “The Rain Song” turned inside out and made into a quirky hat. I have no more time to discuss this, thank goodness.

• Ack, wait what, not a new Guided by Voices album, this cannot be, will Robert Pollard ever take a break from writing five boring new songs every 10 minutes and insisting on recording them? Ever see the end of the 1970s version of Planet Of The Apes, when Charlton Heston is pounding sand and cursing at the sky? Well, that’s me every 15 minutes, when I read that a new GBV album is coming out in time for mention in this column. If you’re keeping count, we’re now at eight GBV albums in three years, and this one’s titled Welshpool Frillies. The single, “Seedling,” is like an angular art-rock version of Yardbirds. It’s not totally bad, but you can tell Pollard wrote it on the potty in 10 minutes, like all his other songs. What-ever.

• Nils Lofgren is in Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, which isn’t necessarily a reason to hate him. In between making Bruuuce albums he makes his own albums, like the forthcoming new Mountains, which is on the way to your pirate music feeds as we speak. In the leadoff single, “Nothin’s Easy (For Amy),” Nils sings like a cross between Willie Nelson and Neil Young, and the refried Americana-bluegrass underneath his voice is even worse. Enjoy, fans of Bruuuce!

• We’ll end the week with not particularly funny comedian/musician Jaboukie Young-White’s new album, All Who Can’t Hear Must Feel, featuring the single “Goner,” whose haunted-house-meets-industrial beat is, I must admit, pretty gosh-darn above-average.

If you’re in a local band, now’s a great time to let me know about your EP, your single, whatever’s on your mind. Let me know how you’re holding yourself together without being able to play shows or jam with your homies. Send a recipe for keema matar. Message me on Twitter (@esaeger) or Facebook (eric.saeger.9).