Album Reviews – Page 7 – Spinning Platters

Album Review: Bleached – Ride Your Heart

It’s hard not to go overboard with the metaphors, but someone took diamond cutting tools and applied them to Mika Miko. The result? Bleached.

I always enjoyed Mika Miko, and seeing them at Nickel City was one of the better shows I’d attended, because there’s little better than playing NBA Jam while they’re yelling into telephones in the other room. So I was excited to hear what Jennifer and Jessica Clavin had been up to since then. It turns out they’ve been brought back from the experimental punked-up cliff, and are now best suited on a ticket with Brilliant Colors or the latest Go-Go’s reunion. Cheers.

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Album Review: The Hot Toddies – Bottoms Up EP

Bottoms Up

In a previous life I was a KSCU DJ, and we’d received an advance of this EP, which had three of the five tracks. So the good news is I really know some of these songs. The bad news is that it still isn’t a full-length.

For those of you just joining us, the Hot Toddies are an Oakland band that continues the Bay Area’s history of girl group garage indie rock. I’ve been fortunate to see bands such as the Kirby Grips, Minipop, Brilliant Colors, She Mob, Run for Cover Lovers, the Reaction, Apogee Sound Club, Persephone’s Bees, … I’m just showing off now. That’s what people in their 30s do when speaking to people in their 20s. If I’m going to be older than you, I might as well be pretentious about it. Continue reading “Album Review: The Hot Toddies — Bottoms Up EP”

Live Blogging With The Devil: Carly Rae Jepsen “Kiss” vs Corin Tucker Band “Kill My Blues”

Tuesday, September 18th. The last record release date of the Summer. This is a special one, too! Two women from the Pacific Northwest have released two highly anticipated sophomore albums. Carly Rae Jepsen is the voice behind the ubiquitous hit “Call Me Maybe.” Corin Tucker is 1/3 of the legendary riot grrl super group Sleater-Kinney. Tonight, I will be listening to both of these records, beginning to end, for the first time. Both records are 12 tracks, so I will be giving my thoughts about 24 different songs as I listen to them. I will alternate between Carly and Corin. For those that wish to follow along at home, I have made a playlist in rdio.com! Keep refreshing, because I will update as I go…

Now, without further adieu, here is “Live Blogging With The Devil: Carly Rae Jepsen vs Corin Tucker”:

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Album Review: The Temper Trap

When a band releases a self-titled album after their debut record, I always take it to mean they’re making a statement of intent. They’re saying, “this is what the band’s going to be about. Everything else before was just a warm up.” But when your warm-up album has the gigantic hit single, “Sweet Disposition,” on it, should you really be calling that practice? What if you don’t have a worthy follow-up? With that in mind, does The Temper Trap make a statement? Or is it just the next album? Continue reading “Album Review: The Temper Trap”

Not Necessarily New Release Tuesday, 11/8/2011

The Sound of Arrows Voyage — What do arrows sound like? They sound like awesome.

Welcome to a new, and possibly recurring feature on Spinning Platters, Not Necessarily New Release Tuesday. In this, I’ll recommend some new music to listen to. Some of these will be actual new releases, but not necessarily. I’ll also be including recently discovered imports, leaked albums, and rediscovered music as well. Sometimes I’ll just try to get you to listen to a forgotten record that I love. Since this is a new feature, I’ll be making it up as I go along so I absolutely want your feedback; therefore, please comment below and together we can make this the best Spinning Platters recurring feature ever. (Take that, Weekly Guide to Bay Area Concerts!) Continue reading “Not Necessarily New Release Tuesday, 11/8/2011”

Live Blogging With The Devil: Lulu – Lou Reed & Metallica

Tonight is an experiment. A record by the odd pairing of Velvet Underground leader Lou Reed and bay area metal titans Metallica. I’ve tried hard to avoid any press or tracks from this record, so this will be as fresh as possible. I am not a fan of either act. I do consider the Velvet Underground to be one of the most important bands ever, and much of Reed’s solo work is fine. I even enjoyed some elements of elements of 2003’s The Raven. As for Metallica, I think that Master Of Puppets and Ride The Lightning are great records, but I haven’t liked much after that. I will admit that I don’t consider St Anger to be absolute garbage. I love the drum sounds on that album, but the songwriting could use some editing.

Anyways, keep refreshing, because I will be updating this throughout my entire listening experience. I don’t know what to expect from this, but I hope you enjoy it:

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Album Review: Playing In The Streets – Right There For You

I have received a lot of free music over the years and all of it has either been good enough to steal or bad enough to be free. I’m happy to say that this was a rare exception to my klepto habit from an up and coming Antioch rock group called Playing in the Streets and their new album Right There for You.

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7″ Review: Schande – “Still Returning”

Jen Schande is one of the Bay Area’s most tried-and-true indie workhorses. She’s been at it in one band or another for damn near two decades: she played pre-fame shows with bands ranging from No Doubt to The Gossip, released a long-sold-out split 7″ with The Cribs that commands quite a high asking price on eBay, and famously saw PJ Harvey at the Whiskey in 1992. In addition to her prolific DJ work, Jen has her namesake band, Schande, which she began focusing on exclusively after parting ways with Boyskout several years back.

Schande are playing at the Hemlock this Saturday, July 30, along with Bam!Bam! and Silent Pictures. And they have a new 7″ out on Future Farmer Recordings, titled Still Returning. Let’s have a listen, shall we?

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Album Review: Tearist – Living: 2009-Present

Tearist’s debut record, Living: 2009-Present, is one of the riskiest debut records in the history of the medium. Instead of taking the traditional route of going into a recording studio, or even bringing a laptop into the rehearsal space to make a solid, consistent sounding record, this band opted to make a record that consists entirely of audience recordings of live shows. The end result is, although a mixed bag, one of the most interesting records that I have heard in a long time.
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Album Review (with bonus movie talk): Daft Punk – TRON: Legacy Original Soundtrack

I’m a fan of the original 1982 movie TRON, even though I’m aware it’s kinda crappy. So I’ve been following the TRON: Legacy hype pretty closely for the last few years. And when I was sent Daft Punk’s TRON: Legacy Original Soundtrack for review, I immediately emailed our lead film reviewer, Jason LeRoy, and called dibs when he got his tickets for a preview screening. Then I began listening to Daft Punk’s film score to get myself psyched. And it worked. I was psyched. Continue reading “Album Review (with bonus movie talk): Daft Punk — TRON: Legacy Original Soundtrack”