Sloan - The Double Cross - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Toronto-based quartet Sloan will their eleventh studio album, the fifteen song collection COMMONWEALTH, that sees Sloan members Jay Ferguson, Chris Murphy, Patrick Pentland, and Andrew Scott creating an old-school double album sequenced with each member staking out a single side as their own artistic dominion. The resulting album is one of the finest of their stellar career!

Art Moore make vivid, heartbreaking short stories. Each song on the newly formed band's self-titled debut album is it's own individual universe of bittersweet feeling a brief snapshot of a moment in time that captures the fragility and occasional impossibility of human connection. These songs are deft character studies, zeroing in on shy beginners, jilted friends and friendly exes, chronicling minute moments-road trips, casual dates, games of truth or dare-with rich detail and subtle wit. Featuring the inimitable songwriting of beloved Oakland luminary Taylor Vick of Boy Scouts set in sharp relief against rich production from Ezra Furman collaborators Sam Durkes and Trevor Brooks, it's a quietly wondrous record - a set of songs that sketch out the struggle and beauty of coping with everyday life. These are songs about tiny, unspoken feelings rendered on a grand scale, moments that often get brushed aside given the weight that they should be. Across these ten stories, Vick, Brooks and Durkes are unsparing in their focus but remarkably generous in their artistry - three pairs of steady, even handscrafting one fine, precious object.

The boiled down brother to their 30 song magnum opus NEVER HEAR THE END OF IT, PARALLEL PLAY is the latest from power pop royalty Sloan. Less a conscious answer to NHTEOI's unabridged creative approach, PARALLEL PLAY is a continuation of the musical concepts put forth on their last album and a further exploration of the band's four-songwriter dynamic. For Sloan, PARALLEL PLAY proves once again that four time the songwriters equals four times the rock.