Kiwi Jr. - Cooler Returns - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Smash cut to Kiwi Jr.'s third album, Chopper, overseen by trusted pilot Dan Boeckner (Wolf Parade, Handsome Furs) on storied Sub Pop Records. Turning nocturnal with necks mock turtle, our Local Kiwi Jr. Takes neon flight off the digital cliff - like The Monkees starring in Blade Runner; like Michael Mann directs Encino Man. Ten songs with synth shimmer, zen gongs with yard strimmer. The signs along the highway read InchLESS BAR, MORE NOIR AHEAD.Inch Ah, those late summer, Joe Strummer, Home on the Range Rover Blues. There's a melancholy to all forms of flight, and the view out the Chopper is as hazy as it gets mission-oriented, both stealth and self-realized. This album is decidedly (yet almost secretly) anti-patio-sunscreen-Beach Boys bachelor cruise sing-a-long. Sure, these songs let a little light through the blinds, but they sting insomnia, corrupt mayors, Kennedy Curses, S*x tapes, and deer rifles. Chopper is the bird's eye view of the big event - a real nighttime character of oil stain, film grain, search light, night flight. It is muscular and fragile; loud yet quiet both an observer and somehow the observed spectacle itself. What was slack in the slacker phase, got tauter, with lacquer glaze. Slick gloss, rightened wrongs; murdered boss, promoted pawns. With Boeckner transmitting high-voltage shocks upon every reach for a familiar instrument, Kiwi Jr. #expands the palette with string machine song, synthesizered oblong, and Dentyne Classic Menthol vocals from area soprano Dorothea Paas (US Girls, Badge Epoch Ensemble) like the missing piece all along. Kiwi Jr. #brings the Chopper to a new space, demilitarizing the technology just like flasks, aviators, and cargo shorts. Graceful in the air above, but when the Chopper lands, there's chaos on the ground. Kiwi Jr. #shout, InchLook Out!Inch When it gets close, it'll blow the hat right off of your head.Hold onto

Ma'alot Quintett - Harmoniemusik for Wind Quintet La Cenerentola [COMPACT DISCS] date 01/26/2010

Since releasing their self-titled debut record in 2012, which The New Yorker called, InchOne of the year's best albums... a punishing, noisy, exhilarating thing,Inch the Toronto-based 3-piece METZ have garnered international acclaim as one of the most electrifying and forceful live acts, touring widely and extensively, playing hundreds of shows each year around the world. Now, Alex Edkins (guitar, vocals), along with Hayden Menzies (drums), and Chris Slorach (bass) are set to unleash their highly-anticipated third full-length album, Strange Peace, an emphatic but artful hammer swing to the status quo. InchThe best punk isn't an assault as much as it's a challenge - to what's normal, to what's comfortable, or simply to what's expected. Teetering on the edge of perpetual implosion,Inch NPR wrote in their glowing review of METZ's 2015 second album, II. Strange Peace was recorded in Chicago, live off the floor to tape with Steve Albini. The result is a distinct artistic maturation into new and alarming territory, frantically pushing past where the band has gone before, while capturing the notorious intensity of their live show. The trio continued to assemble the album (including home recordings, additional instrumentation) in their hometown, adding the finishing touches with longtime collaborator, engineer and mixer, Graham Walsh. Strange Peace isn't merely a collection of eleven uninhibited and urgent songs. It's also a kind of sonic venting, a truculent social commentary that bludgeons and provokes, excites and unsettles. With all the pleasurable tension and anxiety of a fever dream, Strange Peace is equal parts challenging and accessible. It is this implausible balancing act, moving from one end of the musical spectrum to the other, that only a band of METZ's power and capacity can maintain discordant and melodic, powerful and controlled, meticulous and instinctive, s