First things first, let's get the obvious out of the way.

This doesn't sound like a Mountain Goats record.

I mean, the voice is the same. The frantic, bloody-finger-inducing guitar playing is the same (sometimes). The lyrics are just as good as ever. And yet...

There are drums. There are strings. Most of the songs have harmonies (sometimes lots of harmonies). There are no tape wheels grinding in the background. The album cover isn't colored with crayon.

I know this has been a gradual transformation, and Talahassee had just as much production value on it. But it didn't have any songs that song like David Bowie's Heroes.

Anyway, I've been listening to this album for a couple months now, and I think I've gotten to the point of acceptance. So, let's get into the actual review of the songs, shall we?

Basically, with Mountain Goats songs, I tend to divide them into four categories of quality:

Type I - Absolutely awesome songs that completely devastate me emotionally. I know multiple people who can't listen to "Grendel's Mother" without crying. Personally, "Weekend in Western Illinois" does it for me. Other Type I songs include "Going to Georgia," "Orange Ball of Love," "It Froze Me," "No Children"

Type II - Well-written, memorable songs. Good lyrics, but don't have the same emotional heft as Type I songs. Type II songs include "Are You Cleaning Off the Stone," "Sinaloan Milk Snake Song," "Going to Utrecht", "Raid on Entebbe"

Type III - Humorous songs. Best used to introduce people to the Mountain Goats (I have used "Golden Boy" to this effect on multiple occasions), or to lighten the mood after a Type I song when putting together a mix tape. Often quite catchy, but, due to the humorous content, hard to take as seriously. An interesting subset of Type III are the songs that make excessive references to the Inland Empire, which is probably only entertaining to people who have, at some point, lived in the Inland Empire. Other Type III songs include "Beach House," "Itzcuintli-Totzli Days," "Going to Chino"

Type IV - Everything else. Not really bad, but ones I would tend to fast forward.

I should also point out that many songs mask themselves as other types at first. Many people mistake "Going to Georgia" as a Type III upon first hearing it and, only after a few hearings, do they realize that it is, in fact, a Type I. Personally, I mistook "The Best Ever Death Metal Band Out of Denton" as a Type III until I saw it performed live. Clearly I wasn't paying enough attention to the last verse.

So, let's divvy up the new album:

(1) Type I ("Your Belgian Things")
(4) Type II ("Palmcorder Yajna," "Linda Blair Was Born Innocent," "Home Again Garden Grove," "The Young Thousands")
(1) Type III ("Pigs That Ran Straightaway Into the Water, Triumph Of")
(7) Type IV (everything else)

So, Type I-III:Type IV ratio is 6:7, which is not too shabby! By comparison, my favorite Mountain Goats album (Zopilote Machine, if you're curious) comes up with a ratio of 10:9, so, by our scientific methods, it would seem that this is one of the best Mountain Goats albums yet!

But, then again, "Palmcorder Yajna" sounds quite a lot like "Heroes" It's got to lose a couple points for that.

Rating: B

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It's been said that Howie Day sounds like John Mayer and David Gray but I don't hear it. I guess he has that acoustic/mellow thing going on but that's about it. My first exposure to this album was on an American Airlines flight - their in-flight entertainment had a special about stop all the world. "Perfect Time of Day" is the first single from the album and it's quite good but overall I think his last album was quite a bit better. Good work CD.

Rating: B (Not bad but quite mellow)

Topics: albums

So, right off the bat, I should state that I know the members of this band, so I may be a little biased. But damned if these guys don't rock. This album's short - 5 songs, one of which consists mostly of eardrum-rending squealing courtesy of the lead singer's Buchla synthesizer - but right now this is on my top 5 for the year list (and, yes, I know it's only March, but it's been a good year, so it's a competitive list).

Obviously, I'm the right target for this - any band that falls somewhere inbetween JSBX and Nation of Ulysses is going to go over very well with me. So, wanting to make sure I wasn't completely alone here, I passed the CD around to a handful of coworkers with generally good taste. Most of them compared the band to one of the various heavily written-up garage rock bands, which probably bodes well for the Mae-Shi's future.

Sadly, the album isn't really getting a lot of distribution, since it's being burned and printed by members of the band. However, if you're curious, you can listen to it absolutely free at The Official Mae Shi Website. I recommend "You Can't Do That With an Axe" which is probably the best spazz-rock song I've heard in many years. If you live in the Los Angeles area, I'd also recommend seeing them live, though earplugs might be recommended (given the afore-mentioned eardrum-rending capabilities of the Buchla).

Rating: A

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At first I was disappointed with this release. In previous efforts, American Analog Set had crafted a certain quasi-instrumental aesthetic, creating a world where vocals were not always necessary and, if occasionally long and droning, their songs reflected a certain neoclassical, Tortoise-like structure.

In altering that formula, though, I think the band has found a new pop sensibility that appears disposable but is in fact catchy enough to stay.

Though the band no longer produces music as interesting or original as it did, what appear to be slight, soft pop songs with little drive remained in my head - and pleasantly so - for days at a time.

Fans of dream-pop, Stereolab and Air will certainly enjoy these blissy pop numbers. The album is a soothing listen and there several tracks, notably "Punk as Fuck," "Postman" and "Kindness of Strangers" that shine through.

The shorter songs are as carefully crafted as the band’s earlier, longer pieces, weaving farfisa and vocals in and out over the steady drumming and repetitive guitar rhythm. There is little build and release or variation within songs here, but in its spare way, AmAnSet is working on its own hushed pop groove.

Rating: B+

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D-Plan has heard it all - emo, punk, funk, pop and good ol’ barroom rock and roll. Just about every descriptor you could put before four guys on stage with guitars, bass, drums and an old synthesizer.

Perhaps because they hail from the Washington, DC area, there are clumsy comparisons to Fugazi. Though the band’s rhythm section is pretty Dischordant, the Plan harkens back to two earlier bands - Talking Heads and the Clash - who fused the above influences around them into something slightly different, something undeniably bouncing and rocking, and - as those who’ve attended their sweaty shows, the ones with the high schoolers dressed like robots charging the stage, threatening bodily harm to the band even as the rock continues - something for the children.

Playwright Edward Albee once lampooned the need to categorize by referring to a fictional work of art's "quietly noisy relaxed intensity." So too Plan fans will heap on the labels to assure that the band fits into whatever scene the sycophants need to be part of. My attitude: just enjoy it.

Fans of earlier albums will not be disappointed, nor will they find something that sounds entirely similar to what came before. "Change" is not a radical departure; still present is the wailing organ, the tight bass lines, tighter drumming and vocal storytellings of lead singer Travis Morrison.

Morrison also retains his uncanny ability to capture - poetically, I’d venture - moments, like little personal essays, of life in these days, these ages, these cities.

"As kisses go, it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary," begins "Face of the Earth." Morrison then tells us, in reverse, looking back from that first kiss, a relationship exploded and ended. On "Ellen and Ben," he returns to the ramblings that made "You are Invited," from the band’s previous full length, "Emergency and I," so enjoyable.

Some of the band’s melodic choices may come to longtime listeners as a dissonant shock. You realize in listening, however, that the band has made a conscious choice: evolve, experiment and don’t choose the obvious melodic paths. The progressions make sense.

Rating: A- (If nothing else, Jessica Hopper does the band's PR)

Topics: albums

How do you describe a band who says its influences are XTC and Richard Davies when it's clear to you that they sound more like Guided by Voices and Yo La Tengo? Here's what I've said to everyone who's asked: "It's what the Magnetic Fields would sound like if they were an Elephant 6 band."

Clearly, this band also would like to be from New Zealand. But they're from Minneapolis. So if you find youself listening to this record and waiting for the rock to begin, you will be disappointed.

If, on the other hand, you’re expecting 44 lo-fi pop songs that rarely clock in at more than two minutes yet transcend their length, Work of Saws' debut record is for you.

This sprawling CD ranges from acoustic instrumentals to show tunes to Pet Sounds harmonies, offering weird pop ditties that recall both Olivia Tremor Control and Quasi.

Songwriter Brock Davis makes poetry out of weird juxtapositions in his tales of death, friendship and silliness. This should be apparent from the album's title and songs like "Reading Material and the Silence of Cement," "Hopeful Missiles," "Smaller Ink on Maps," "Baritone Astronaut Quartet," "I, Son of Math," "Crown State Rhino" and "Buttercup, You're a Canyon."

While the titles and lengths might strike you as throwaways, the songs are actually poignant more often than not. The catchy "Kenny Rogers was Lonely" is preoccupied not with the irony of a has-been but with mall life.

To quote, at random, from, uh, "Losing Vertical Hold:"

Never was I one to sit here alone
The rain will rust my ear to the phone
I think I think you’re making a home out of me.
Sure I’m losing veritcal hold
A sharpened smile will never grow old
I think I think you’re making a home out of me.

There's certainly the burden of consistency on any artist who puts out an album with this many songs on it. There’s also a burden of quality on artists who insist on writing songs that by many standards are no longer than a chorus or a bridge.

The burden is mostly - but not wholly - met. Only a couple songs are throwaways, but others seem to begin promisingly but come to an end after a mere minute. But given the band's claim that they selected 44 songs from hundreds the prolific Davis has written, the style is an art form I'm willing to allow. Plenty of non-album tracks are on their Web site for download!

If only... among Davis's stable of musicians is one singer with a lisp, which is ever so distracting at the quieter moments during the songs on which he sings.

Rating: A- (If you think "Her Majesty" is the best song on Abbey Road, run, don't walk...)

Topics: albums

The single biggest disadvantage to being a college radio DJ is an increased tendency to judge an album just on the basis of a few recommended tracks. Generally the system works pretty well (if anything, it leads to a greater enthusiasm for otherwise average bands -- my deep love of Sweet Nothing is based solely on the song "That Ticking Sound"), but I am now forced to condemn it, for the sole reason that it has taken me years to properly appreciate the fabulous Cakekitchen album, The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea.

For those not familiar with the band, The Cakekitchen is the project of Graeme Jefferies (also of This Kind of Punishment, the group he was in with his slightly-more-famous brother, Peter Jefferies) For the most part, the album is just Graeme and his drummer, with the esteemed Alastair Galbraith lending occassional support on the violin. Sonically, it is certainly not out of place with the 90's New Zealand sound (chorus-laden guitars, Robyn Hitchcock-y vocals), but with a slightly more aggressive avant-garde noise approach. Very good, but just listening to the recommended tracks (most likely "Bald Old Bear", the single released prior to the album) doesn't begin to tell half the story.

Worth listening to, of course, but put on "I Know You Know" and tell me that isn't one of the best songs ever. Sounds like Galbraith when he's trying to be melodic, but with great vocals and guitar work. Fabulous. Then let the album play. Listen to "You Make A God of Money" (what a title!). Starts all sleepy and pretty, then, abruptly, they rock out. Not many bands can handle that kind of transition without sounding forced, but it springs forth so naturally you can't help but admire it.

And it stays just as good. I'm a big fan of the strummy, acoustic songs, but the strange noisy ones (featuring highway sounds) are great in their own own.

Retroactively added to my Favorite Albums of the 90's list.

Rating: A

Topics: albums

I've had this album for about 2 months - in that time, I've passed it by for other music in my collection, both new and old. The album itself has moved from one CD shelf (on this rickety, cheap "adjustable shelf" monstrosity) to another (on this not-so-cheap, rotating CD carousel); from one side of my room to another; from one end of the state in a neglected bin to the conspicuous confines of my hefty collection. But in all this movement, the booklet hasn't been removed, the CD hasn't been taken from the case, and the price tag wasn't even removed. Whatever reason there might be to blame for this, it certainly wasn't for lack of interest - were that the case, I wouldn't have bothered dropping the cash to pick this up. Maybe the CD thinks that was the case, though, for when I finally played it, it seemed to hold a serious grudge against me.

Atari Teenage Riot are the originators, innovators, and creators of Digital Hardcore (the music, and the record label). For a description of their sound, look no further than the name - just replace the usual guitar-drums backing of regular hardcore punk with samplers, drum machines, and other studio machinery, and there you are. Same screaming, same anger, and (in some ways) the same rhetoric. It some ways, this digital hardcore sounds weaker - drum machines, no matter how many BPMs they're doing, will never sound as fierce as actual drums. However, using machines does have its advantages - hearing the nonstop onslaught of the first two tracks give way to an actual string backing in "Western Decay" is more jarring & disruptive than any actual pedal-to the-floor bleeeeaaaarrrggghhh!! could be.

Alec Empire (the DHR / ATR mastermind) certainly knows what he's doing behind the boards - the backings created by him and co-ATRer Nic Endo are interesting enough, creating soundscapes from spastic Rolands and other obnoxious squeals. However, these backdrops fail to keep the pro-forma hardcore motifs (the screaming, the drums, the screaming) from getting stale. Ironically, the track on this album that shares the name of Alec's empire ("Digital Hardcore") turns out to be a complete mess, bouncing from staccato drumming to random voices to other discordant choices, with each section well outlasting its welcome. It's no surprise to me, though, given what the album revealed itself to be.

No, I wasn't a big fan of the vocals (which seemed to be approximating the CAPITAL LETTERS and exclamation points spread throughout the lyrics in the liner notes). And, no, I really couldn't tell what they were all so angry about (since the lyrics I could make out were of the generic / universal angry-at-the-man variety). However, I wanted to give this a shot. While the group's energy and creativity carried me through the first few songs, I soon slid into a bored slump. Upon further though, I decided to appreciate it the same way that I've learned to appreciate Big Black - for the "rock", both musically and vocally. However, even Big Black knew enough to take the piss out of their ridiculously aggressive stance. Maybe ATR was going for that affect by name-checking their group like a bunch of would-be hip-hop homies bling-blingin' the jigga wha. That made me chuckle, but I don't think that was the desired effect.

Somewhere around "Ghostchase", my cool-noise appreciation shield dropped, and I soon hit the same rut that I hit whenever I listen to most regular hardcore. After hearing someone scream at the...

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Those of you out there who are big Chucklehound Entertainment fans will notice that the corporate headquarters for Chucklehound relocated about a year ago from sunny Claremont, California (heart of the unstoppable Inland Empire Lo-Fi Rock Revolution) to cold and boring Harwich, Massachusetts. Even though there is plenty to complain about, one of the worst is the lack of availabilty of product from the afore-mentioned Inland Empire scene, most notably Shrimper Records releases. There is an undefinable thrill at being able to go down to your local record store and pick up the latest cassette by the Amps for Christ or Furniture Huschle. Sadly, this thrill is completely lost to me now.

Or so I thought....

This morning, I popped into the local Border's to get a birthday present for my dad and caught, out of the corner of my eye, a Dennis Callaci record cover. "Huh?" I said aloud. "Did I really see that? I am just going through Shrimper withdrawl hallucinations?"

At this point, numerous people were staring at me as I sprinted towards the music section. "Hell, yeah!" I bellowed at the top of my lungs, as I plunged my hands into the CD racks and withdrew the CD version of Dump's That Skinny Motherfucker with the High Voice.

After spending a few minutes trying to convince the Border's staffers to let me make my purchase before they forcibly ejected me from the store, I took a good look at what I had acquired. It appears to be a CD-reissue of the seminal Shrimper cassette of the same name that was released back in '99 (a cassette, it is worth mentioning, was the first factory-duplicated cassette release in Shrimper's release). A quick glimpse of the track listings reveals that it contains not only the fabulous tracks from the cassette, but bonus tracks! Who doesn't love bonus tracks? (though, in an ideal world, the cassette would have more tracks than the CD...)

I must say, though, for all my avowed love of magnetic tape and vinyl, there is something to be said for the peace of mind of knowing that I can leave this in the car without it being melted into plastic scrap. (I've gotten in the habit of buying multiple copies of Shrimper tapes for exactly that reason...) The bonus tracks are nice, but draw from some of the weaker selections in Prince's catalog.

Did I forget to mention that the whole album is a selection of Prince covers? That's the sort of thing you're supposed to mention in these things, right?

Huh?

I'm supposed to provide interesting info about the band as well? But that's so boring!

All right, all right. I'll give you band info.

Dump is James McNew.

There! You happy?

Who's James McNew? You're kidding, right?

You need to get out more.

Hey, there's no need for violence! Fine, James McNew is the bassist and sometimes guitarist and vocalist for Yo La Tengo.

You don't know who Yo La Tengo are? To quote Flavor Flav, "I can't do nuthin' for you, man."

To further quote Mr. Flav, "Yo mama's got brass nipples."

No, I don't know what that means either. Leave me alone, I've got a review to finish here.

Where was I? Oh, yeah, this album is a collection of Prince covers done in Dump's usual lo-fi wall-of-sound approach. The production works well on all the songs, but after a certain point, there's only so much you can do with A Love Bizarre. However, the...

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Rating: B-

Topics: albums

Take The Cult, throw in some Blue Cheer, Failure and Kyuss. What do you get? Two former members of Fu Manchu who slather a percussive assault of harmonics and atmosphere spread thick to tantalize your taste for altered states of reality.

Opening track, "To The Center," lays the foundation with fuzzed-out distortion, Eddie Glass' high-pitched, chorused vocals, and lyrics alluding to flying through space, or something...The next copupla tracks are pretty standard, riff-heavy rockers that include some interesting Rhodes grooves and hand clapping choruses. By track 5, "Freedom," assuming you've followed Nebula's recipe for enlightened listening,you should be in the right state to appreciate the most Desert Rock/Kyuss-like track on the album. Consistent musical and lyrical themes are pretty much standard on the album as a whole: "Freedom," is no exception, and succeeds in delivering a creative, melodic rocker, complete with Sitar, that you wouldn't be embarrassed playing at full volume, in your 81 Camaro, on a mild summer's day. Nebula seem to discover different ways of being "under the influence," though, and it's not until the last 2 tracks that "To the Center" really picks up again. When it does, the last two tracks, "Between Time" and "You mean Nothing" rock out with a vengeance, and leave you waiting for their next release. Overall, great production, and a heck of a lot of fun to listen to.

Rating: B (Stoner Rock)

Topics: albums

Beautiful CD. Great to see this guy release a full length. For fans of GOOD D n' B, this one will satisfy: flying through azure skys...Lots of flutes, strong dub influence, presents music as textured topography, layered and sweeping

Now, if only the DJs in America would kick the pipe and throw down music as decent as this, then maybe D'n B would start to get respect from the domestic techno community.

If you ever enjoyed intelligent techno back in the day, ie 1992-1995, from the likes of Vapourspace, Speedy J, Orbital, and most of the releases on Intellinet and Telepathic, this CD belongs in your collection. This is one of the most atmospheric and creative releases to date.

Rating: A+ (Beautiful D n' B)

Topics: albums

I've noticed a disturbing trend with my output here. Most of the films are horrible. Really horrible. And yet I sit through them, just so I can write a horrible review. However, the music reviews are overwhelmingly positive. Why is it that I am willing to sit through 100 minutes of visual pablum, but will stop listening to a subpar album within mere moments of determining just how bad it is? Something's clearly wrong.

So, in an order to correct this imbalance, here is a review of a pretty darn mediocre album. Now, in order to overcome my impulse to cease listening to a bad album, I selected an album that should have been one of the best of the year.

The 6ths, for those who don't know, is yet another project by Stephin Merritt, best known for his main project, The Magnetic Fields, which is one of the better pop bands operating today. However, Merritt prefers to have others sing his songs, and so was born the 6ths. The previous album, Wasps' Nest, contained brilliant pop songs sung by a variety of indie-rock superstars, such as Lou Barlow, Georgia Hubley, Dean Wareham, and Chris Knox. All in all a fine album.

Sadly, the follow-up is a significant departure from the last. Instead of attempting to produce a good album, they have decided to release a bad one. Really bad. A lot of the fault comes from the choice of guest singers. Some are selected along the same lines as the first (e.g, Clare Grogan, Bob Mould, Sally Timms), but most of the tracks are sung by Stephin Merritt's artistic twins (Momus, Marc Almond, Neil Hannon) or older artists that are well past their prime (Dominique A, Odetta, Melanie). This alone would make for a mediocre album, but the songwriting drops it down to utter trash. Merritt has always had a fondness for slow ballads, but here they sink down to Neil Diamond level (and not in a good "Sweet Caroline" way, but in an excreable "Turn On Your Heartlight" kind of way)

While the first album managed to overcome the "celebrity karaoke" feel that the concept lends itself to, this album feels like being trapped in a highly-recommended bar that can't mix a decent Tom Collins.

Rating: F (28.5%)

Topics: albums

I have more CDs than most folks would ever want or need. I buy more on a semi-weekly (or, more often, daily) basis. And, in some strange O. Henry twist of fate, my passion for music decreases with every purchase. I've lost my passion, my zeal, my je ne sais quoi. I've lost that damned naive desire to hear something NEW and EXCITING, to take a chance and try out something different. Instead, I find myself collecting CDs, completing discographies, listlessly wandering music racks like a zombie stuck in a remedial English class. At this rate, I'll be purchasing Top 40 CDs just for a change of pace. (And, you know, I DO hear a definite improvement in Britney Spears' newest song - she seems to be shaking off the shackles and clothing that typified her _Baby, One More Time_ phase, and...)

Um. Yeah.

So, in a desperate attempt to regain some of this lost passion, I'm going to write about a CD I purchased simply because of association and name-value. Lake of Dracula - even before I knew who was in the band, I thought, "Damn, that's a GREAT name for a band; like a long lost Hammer film." Images of bloody hands emerging from murky lagoons did the Sugar Plum Fairy dance in my sleeping little head. Indeed, as I look at the cover of this CD, such a hand is pictured on the cover.

Now, if the name of the band / album isn't enough to get your fangs throbbing, let's just say that two-thirds of this combo also did / do time in some of the more invigorating rock outfits available for (non-)popular consumption. On guitar is Walter Weasel, the brains & beat behind free-jazz terrorists The Flying Luttenbachers (and also a good-lookin' zombie-type in thick metallers Heatwave). Heather M, on the drums on this record, also beat the logs for the Scissor Girls, the closest an American band has come to approximating the chaos embodied by the Fall. And if that's not enough, you can find the pseudonymously-credited Al Johnson (the mewler / moaner that leads the broken-leg marching of US Maple) offering a few bon mots here and there. (I think that mention of KoKo Taylor is all his.)

If you know anything about the bands I just namedropped, you have a vague idea of what you're in for. (Did I mention that this was released on Skin Graft? Does that tighten the canvas any?) However, even if you think this will be another run-of-the-mill No-Wave excursion into polysyllabic yawping and Shaggs-like instrument-mangling, you'd be selling this Lake a bit short. What's contained on this disc is THE epitome of No-Wave polysyllabic instrument-mangling.

You have Walter Weasel beating his guitar the same way he beats the drums in the Luttenbachers - violently and thickly. You have Heather M simplifying the chuga-chuga rhythms of Moe Tucker, but with the volume knob stuck at 11, and with drumsticks the size of a wrestler's legs. And you have newcomer Marlon Magas, reading his high-school angst-ridden poetry upside-down and cut-up into confetti-sized pieces and mixed with Misfit lyrics and stupid missent e-mail scrawls (complete with punctuation miscues). You'll be hard pressed to find a vocalist that hawks up phlegm as well as he does. And to this, you add Jim O'Rourke's rogue streaks of inspiration behind the boards, adding some string interludes at the beginning of the album, letting the sound of a car alarm sneak onto the tape, slicing and dicing tape like a Benihana chef on speed, and (most importantly) knowing when to let things be. The grooves this combo...

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Rating: A+ (Primo BLKJKJLAAHKJHGJD!)

Topics: albums

Lately, I've been feeling more than a little unimpressed with pop music. I buy new albums from my favorite bands and respond with a resounding "eh." I try listening to new, much beloved (and hyped) bands (like, say, Death Cab for Cutie) and respond, once again, "eh."

So, the other day on a mailing list someone mentions falling in love with a song by Dear Nora. Never heard of them, but work is slow, so I download "Since You Went Away."

Damn.

I mean, we're not talking about anything new or groundbreaking. It comes as no surprise that they're from the Pacific Northwest (Portland, to be specific) and have that K Records-lofi vibe to them, but completely missing any sense of self-importance that has made that scene so hard to stomach in recent years. Nothing exciting in the arrangements -- guitar, bass, drums, female vox. Sonically, this band could have released 7"'s on Harriet and fit right in with early Vehicle Flips and Lotus Eaters without missing a beat.

But the songs are so darn charming. They manage to do the light, mid-90's indie pop without resorting to being overly twee (Tokidoki, Jumprope) or overly influenced by the Beach Boys and their ilk (Apples in Stereo).

Really, the only flaw is that the songs are just too short. Most songs clock in at 2 minutes or less, and with only 12 tracks, it's over too quickly.

To get started with Dear Nora, download Since You Went Away from Magic Marker Records now.

-- some more thoughts on Dear Nora a week later --

A day hasn't gone by when I haven't listened to this album, which is saying a lot. It comes with me everywhere. (Incidentally, a drive to the supermarket coincides perfectly with the playing of the first three tracks on the album. What timing!

I can already tell that this is going to be THE album I associate with Spring 2001.

Rating: A- (Would be higher, but the songs just aren't long enough)

Topics: albums