Staff Picks for February 2017
February 28, 2017
The one and only full-length by the masked rave duo is still one of the high points of the era. Blatantly swiping samples from Detroit techno and earlier U.K. acid house pioneers like 808 State and piling on samples of crowd noise, their tracks were ecstatic, cartoonish, and loads of fun. The album was recently reissued on vinyl (with bonus tracks and remixes) after not being available on wax since its original 1992 release. Watch your bass bins, I'm tellin' ya!
February 27, 2017
Julie London's ability to interpret a song was at its strongest in the late '50s and early '60s, as is evidenced on the shimmering Around Midnight. The drowsy "Black Coffee" and lazy "Lush Life" typify the late-night feel of the album, leading right into "The Wee Small Hours of the Morning."
February 26, 2017
Over a decade after the release of their beloved debut, the Seattle emo-punks return this month with their sophomore LP. Revisiting Phantoms 12 years later, it's impressive how much the songs hold up. For fans of the genre, this is essential listening and one of the seminal releases from that era. Blast off with "In Too Far," "Breathless," "Over You," and "Permanent." Yearning and earnestness rarely rock this hard.
![Parade [Music From the Motion Picture Under the Cherry Moon]](https://fastly-s3.allmusic.com/release/mr0001342091/front/400/rMM54M3mvu38By3p3wLprYAf7E_1E-2MlBBPmPAXRBU=.jpg)
February 25, 2017
Originally conceived as a double album, Parade has the sprawling feel of a double record, even if it clocks in around 45 minutes. Prince & the Revolution shift musical moods and textures from song to song, and they're determined not to play it safe, even on the hard funk of "Girls and Boys" and "Mountains," as well as the stunning "Kiss," which hits hard with just a dry guitar, keyboard, drum machine, and layered vocals. All of the group's musical adventures do nothing to undercut the melodicism of the record, and the amount of ground they cover in 12 songs is truly remarkable.
February 24, 2017
Rather than mess with the formula, Goatwhore opted to simply turn everything up, resulting in the least forward-thinking, yet most sonically rewarding and punishing album of their career. As per usual, they are ruthlessly efficient, unmerciful, redundant, triumphant, and wholly invested in darkness, volume, destruction, and little else.
February 23, 2017
The band was still finding its way on its debut LP, which features songs like the fractured "Hún Jörð...," a percussion and distortion-driven track that eschews the band's usual fragility for something that borders on aggression -- it even has outright screaming vocals. They don't play that one live these days.
February 22, 2017
Rhonda Vincent's third album for Rounder hits that almost perfect balance between sparkling contemporary bluegrass production and the heartfelt songwriting and passionate playing of classic traditional bluegrass. Highlighted throughout by breakup waltzes, makeup stompers, '40s train songs, '70s trucker songs, and up-to-the-minute acoustic folk numbers, One Step Ahead is all over the place thematically, but right on the money stylistically.
February 21, 2017
After their lackluster second album, the duo seemed out of gas and ideas. Anyone who thought that, myself among them, was ever so wrong. Instead of packing it in, they came storming back with this fiery, mysterious and kinda dangerous blast of noise, dirt and glamour. It's rare that bands can get back their initial spark after losing it so drastically, since the release of this album the Raveonettes have somehow managed to keep it burning as darkly as ever.
February 20, 2017
Peeping Tom is too fastidiously crafted to be a mere middle finger aimed at the mainstream music scene. Look a little deeper, and you'll notice that Patton seems to be poking fun at himself as well, pointing out that the cult acclaim and indie cred he's garnered in his own corner of the industry are really no more meaningful than the commercially driven teen pop stardom that's so often thought to be his very antithesis.
February 19, 2017
Thirty-six years after her acclaimed 1969 debut, the British folk singer followed up with this album, produced by composer and atmosphere impresario Max Richter. Despite many collaborators, including Devendra Banhart, Joanna Newsome, and Robert Kirby (who arranged the strings on her first record as well as Nick Drake's albums), Bunyan's voice and songs are always center stage.
February 18, 2017
Employing a lush string section, stiletto-sharp bursts of brass, and electric piano melodies that twinkle like stars, Verocai's heady productions draw on folk, jazz, and pop traditions from both sides of the equator to make music that is both immediately familiar and quite unlike anything else you've ever experienced.
February 17, 2017
Though less successful than their critically lauded 1988 landmark, Fisherman's Blues, the Waterboys' follow-up was a wonderfully vibrant pastiche of the traditional folk-rock styles Mike Scott and his Raggle Taggle-era band had been exploring.
February 16, 2017
While other death metal singers are difficult or impossible to understand -- and make a point of being that way -- it's usually easy to understand the lyrics Bret Hoffmann is belting out. So when the Florida band tears into such gruesome offerings as "Multiple Stab Wounds," "Remnants of Withered Decay," and "Thou Shall Kill!," one knows just how gruesome they are.
February 15, 2017
Agalloch's biggest strength, much like the early work of Ulver and Katatonia, is their ability to create an epic type of listening experience without resorting to bombast or heavy-handedness. It is not just the range of sounds that's impressive, but rather how smoothly they are woven together, creating an album that flows from beginning to end, using its entire 68-minute running time to make its point without wearing out its welcome.
February 14, 2017
This is where Kane starts to take his place as one of hip-hop's first sex symbols, thanks to the gliding "Smooth Operator," the somewhat dated ballad "To Be Your Man," and the Teddy Riley-produced new jack swing track "I Get the Job Done." If the latter is a blatant attempt at crossing over, with a vastly different sound than anything else on the album, it's also a player's statement of purpose.
February 13, 2017
For those who feel 2017 could use a dose of fun and smart, it might be the perfect time to dust off this treasure, which ushered in the '90s with songs like "Birdhouse in Your Soul" and "Particle Man." Don't be discouraged by certain track titles; "Minimum Wage" doesn't get political, and it never hurt anyone to remember that it's "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)." Listeners are on their own, though, with "Your Racist Friend."
February 12, 2017
The Hardest Part dives headfirst into a southern soul-tinged countrypolitan sound, complete with string and horn sections. The Beatlesque, mellotron-infused "Send Down an Angel" sounds almost like "Strawberry Fields Forever" with less LSD and more whiskey, while "Is It Worth It" feels like Dusty Springfield is back in Memphis again.
February 11, 2017
Fresh from the success of "Mind Playing Tricks on Me," his breakthrough hit with the Geto Boys, Scarface continued his streak of excellence with his exceptionally creative solo debut. Scarface had always been the standout Geto Boy, and he's finally given ample space for his street narratives on Mr. Scarface Is Back, one of the first gangsta rap albums to offer as much imagination as it does exploitation.
February 10, 2017
This 1995 debut is pretty close to perfect. Delivering punked-up Britpop, Elastica is strutting, sexy, confident and cool. It clocks in at under 40-minutes, making for an easy listen that is punctuated by some of the best nuggets from this era. Beside the enduring "Connection," other standouts include "Line Up," "Car Song," "Hold Me Now," and the glorious slacker anthem "Waking Up." The band is teasing a 2017 return, so get acquainted.
February 9, 2017
For the most part, this debut is an album of aggressive, unapologetically gritty funk. On classics like "Rigor Mortis," "Funk, Funk," and "Post Mortem," one can pinpoint Cameo's influences, but at the same time, these gems demonstrate that even in 1977, Cameo had a recognizable sound of its own.
February 8, 2017
With a shockingly tight performance and a handful of evil anthems, Glen Benton and company managed to craft a death metal classic with their eponymous debut. "Lunatic of God's Creation" may be one of the best death metal songs written in this period, while "Carnage in the Temple of the Damned" is a speed-happy chunk of blasphemy that borders on grindcore.
February 7, 2017
Exuding pure pop swagger, Navy Blues may not have any chart-busting hits, but each track does a terrific job balancing Beatle-esque harmony and muscular guitars. The album's best-known song, "Money City Maniacs," lifts bits from Kiss, AC/DC and Thin Lizzy to craft arguably the boldest rock track in their catalog.
February 6, 2017
2017 marks the 10-year anniversary of the sole album from Houston-based grindcore trio Insect Warfare. World Extermination delivered 20 scathing, hyperspeed outbursts in 22 minutes, which is just right for those looking to improve their 5K time.
February 5, 2017
Various Artists
Spread out over two discs, this vibrant and appealing collection of vintage Peruvian funk, rock, and cumbia is culled from the archives of producer Alberto Maraví's legendary Infopesa label. Chichadélicas serves as a great introduction to both the Infopesa and the creative musical explosion it generated.
February 4, 2017
If you watched BET in the 1990's, you likely crossed paths with the video for flautist Phillip Bent's banging cover of WAR's "The World is a Ghetto." Filmed in front of white studio backdrop and featuring Bent's stylishly besuited quartet, as well an intercut fly girl-style dancer, the track was one of the great forgotten hits of the "acid jazz" era. Bent's accompanying album, 1993's The Pressure, was an equally thrilling time capsule that, in retrospect, seemed to portend a progressive world, scored to a chic melange of jazz, hip-hop and R&B, that never quite materialized.
February 3, 2017
Partially conceived by Delia Derbyshire of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, An Electric Storm went down in history as one of the strangest, most unique albums ever recorded. This avant-garde electronic pop opus was stitched together entirely by magnetic tape, with no synthesizers in sight, and it sounds mind-boggling nearly half a century after it was recorded. Nobody has come close to creating anything remotely similar to this album.
February 2, 2017
Hem's debut album is a beautiful and sorrowful collection of acoustic songs to break a heart and mend it back together again. Based around simple piano chords and often backed by a subtle string section and light orchestration, the songs are warmly intimate in no small part to Sally Ellyson's gentle voice.
February 1, 2017
With The Complete Capitol Singles: 1957-1966, Omnivore rounds up all of the original mono mixes of the A- and B-sides of the singles Buck Owens & His Buckaroos released during their prime of 1957-1966. Buck designed these records to cut through the compression of AM radio and, all these years later, the singles still have an electric snap that's exhilarating.