Alternative music reviews http://soundblab.com/ http://soundblab.com/images/soundblab.png http://soundblab.com/ editor@soundblab.com (Rich Morris) Copyright 2012 Soundblab Ltd support@soundblab.com (Nick Honer) http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4646 Wed, 16 May 2012 19:20:00 GMT Remember that first wave of Best Coast singles? Great songs all, whose brevity and lack of pretensions left space for the listener to implant their own memories and fantasies. And how about those venerable influences (The Ronettes! The Shangri-Las! The Beach Boys!) being used in the way they were... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4646 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4643 Wed, 16 May 2012 06:11:00 GMT 90s rock band Garbage have returned with their fifth studio album, which also happens to be their first in over seven years. It may not feel like its been seven years, but sadly some of us have been sat in a world for nearly a decade where the only... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4643 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4645 Tue, 15 May 2012 07:57:00 GMT I'm slightly disappointed, but not unexpectedly; after hearing their preview of' It's a Party' to give us a taste of what their mostly anticipated third album would sound like, I even doubted that there would be a second single, let alone third. Evidently not as heavy as their previous stuff, a... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4645 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4644 Tue, 15 May 2012 05:11:00 GMT You can tell that DZ Deathrays have been listening to Pulled Apart By Horses. 'Bloodstreams', a title inspired by Mötley Crüe's autobiography, is filled with the raucous, heavy rock riffs and throaty shouting the Leeds band have purveyed recently. But 'Bloodstreams' is by no means a copy-cat album or... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4644 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4631 Sun, 13 May 2012 09:38:00 GMT Tigercats are everything you could hope to hate about East London's indie scene, turned up to good. The group is completely steeped in the conventions and lore of their stomping ground and their record provides a soundtrack to a summer in the dives and dumps of Dalston. The group is... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4631 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4640 Sat, 12 May 2012 10:29:00 GMT OFF! are a collective of some of hardcore's finest ever exponents: Keith Morris (Black Flag, Circle Jerks), Dimitri Coats (Burning Brides), Steven McDonald (Redd Kross) and Mario Rubalcaba (Hot Snakes/Earthless/Rocket From the Crypt). Together, they rifle through 16 songs in 16 minutes, which to most mere mortals is simply incomprehendable. The... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4640 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4637 Fri, 11 May 2012 09:33:00 GMT Danny Coughlan is Crybaby, simple as that really. No frills or need to dress it up in any other way. Armed with his plaintive but soulful voice and his penchant for all things classic 50s/60s, he delivers his heart and soul on this his eponymous album. Coughlan raids the simplicity of... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4637 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4630 Thu, 10 May 2012 14:28:00 GMT Nowadays, when people hear of The Proclaimers, their memories turn to Peter Kay and Matt Lucas' use of '500 Miles' for Comic Relief. However, the brothers Reid are far more than just a comic pair themselves (despite their resemblance to Frankie Boyle), often producing melodic ditties in the mould of... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4630 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4638 Thu, 10 May 2012 05:54:00 GMT Its been three years since Marilyn Manson released his last album and Born Villain, his eighth studio album, has been in the works for a good two years. Overall, the album sounds like the sort of product you would expect from Manson by now after nearly two decades in the... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4638 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4635 Thu, 10 May 2012 03:26:00 GMT The Futureheads have always been a band known for their vocal harmonies, mixed among their slightly raucous, punk-tinged indie songs. Rant, however, is something totally different, in that it is purely a cappella, no edgy guitar parts, just vocal arrangements and, well, rants. The 12 songs on the album are a... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4635 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4639 Thu, 10 May 2012 01:53:00 GMT Fresh from a 15 month world tour the brothers Reid have lost none of their trademark melodic magic on this taster for the forthcoming album Like Comedy. 'Spinning Around in the Air' brings together the pair's knack for a witty lyric - "Let me rephrase that, I think there's a... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4639 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4633 Wed, 09 May 2012 08:15:00 GMT It's practically 12 months ago to the day that I interviewed The Heartbreaks and they promised me (and everyone else, of course) that their album would be out within a year. Give or take a week or so, they've lived up to that promise. And it's something that these guys... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4633 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4632 Tue, 08 May 2012 02:08:00 GMT Sacramento's Death Grips don't go out of their way to be likeable, or even listenable really. Whether you like them will depend on how much you enjoy extreme noise made by posturing, heavily tattooed men who look and sound like they could wrap a bike chain round your neck soon... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4632 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4628 Sun, 06 May 2012 10:43:00 GMT You wait two decades for an album and three come at once. Well, not exactly. After 21 long years, interjected by a couple of cover versions and several false starts, Kevin Shields is finally unleashing remastered versions of the seminal Isn't Anything and Loveless, as well as a full collection... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4628 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4627 Sun, 06 May 2012 04:31:00 GMT The Latitudes Sessions were started by Southern Records sometime around 2005 and have so far produced some wonderfully spontaneous and unique results from the likes of Shit and Shine, Mount Eerie, Sir Richard Bishop and Gang Gang Dance. You may have surmised from that brief list that these live sessions... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4627 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4624 Sat, 05 May 2012 10:50:00 GMT The Milk are starting to cause quite a stir amongst the British press at the moment, being bigged up by both the Guardian and NME and selling out shows across multiple reputable venues without even having a record deal; these Essex rockers must be doing something right. Just like a hip... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4624 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4625 Sat, 05 May 2012 02:39:00 GMT Sub Pop delves deeper into Seattle's hip hop scene with this album from Stasia Irons and Catherine Harris-White. These self-proclaimed "queens of the stoned-age" will be familiar to those who have been following Shabazz Palaces, also signed to Sub Pop. While Shabazz's frontman Ishmael Butler crops up here on 'God',... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4625 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4626 Fri, 04 May 2012 04:24:00 GMT Another fine Latitudes Sessions release from Southern Records. This time it's the turn of psych-rock three-piece The Entrance Band. This series of releases really excels at introducing people to new, underexposed and exciting music and The Entrance Band session is thankfully no exception. These three tracks were recorded after their... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4626 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4623 Thu, 03 May 2012 10:11:00 GMT Prog rock duly disappeared after the fresh sound of punk shoved it over the cliff and into another dimension. It wasn't until the turn of the 90s that a twisted and fucked up version melded into another musical sub-culture: Post-rock. Due mainly to the nascent Slint with their ground breaking... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4623 http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4622 Tue, 01 May 2012 11:29:00 GMT This little EP is a collection of four different remixes of 'Everything Goes My Way', one of the best songs from Metronomy's 2011 album The English Riviera. Four permutations of the same song may sound like a bit of a trial, but the group's ambient beats work even better when... http://soundblab.com/content/content/view/id/4622