Album Reviews: August 2013 Week 4

Killah Priest - "The Psychic World Of Walter Reed" 2013

The level of ambition Killah Priest has on this album is insane. 41 tracks, most of which are dealing with his unique perspective on life, religion, and history. I might not agree with some of the stuff he says, but you can't knock someone so dedicated that is at least making some sort of logical sense when philosophizing about life. The production on this project is actually pretty decent throughout, and in my opinion, a step above a lot of the albums he's put out over the last 8 or so years. This album has an extremely long running time, and it can be hard to listen to all in one sitting, but there's plenty of good songs to choose from. Check out these cool animated videos for "The Winged People" and "Ein Sof (Paradise)". Also check out this video for "L Theanine". "Fortune Teller", "How I Write", and "New Reality" are all worth hearing as well.

Anagraphs - "All That You Were" 2013

I love it when you can clearly see/hear someone improving over time and slowly realizing their vision of sound. I had started to wonder if this guy had given it up completely. It's been nearly a year of no new releases, but low and behold, here is the new EP from Anagraphs. Every aspect of this is a step up from previous releases. My one main gripe about his older stuff was the clunkyness and overall sound of the drum programming, but all the programming on this new one is enjoyable. He's taken his atmospheric background noises to a new level too. When you listen on headphones you can hear all these different sounds swirling around your head like waves, and the only sounds that really ever come to the forefront are droney electric guitar noises, which is something new added to the formula, and it really fits well with everything else going on in the songs. 7 tracks and no weak ones at all. Download or listen here.

Anika - "EP" 2013

It's really weird how much i'm attracted to this girl's music, when on the surface it doesn't really seem like much. Yet I crave to listen to these songs repeatedly and discover intricacies within the production and song structure each new listen. I love it when stuff seems simple until you look at it up close and find out there's much more to it. Most of the songs on this EP are covers of old songs, but she breathes new life into these tunes and makes them her own, and that's what a good cover should be. There's going to be the obvious comparisons to Nico and The Velvet Underground by some people, due to her singing style and accent, but I don't believe Nico ever made anything that was this actually great and not pretentious. Really high quality stuff that I would especially recommend for people who enjoy the lo-fi new wave style from the late 70's/early 80's. Check out the video for her cover of The Kinks' "I Go To Sleep". Also check out this odd and funny video for "In The City", that has the same feel as something directed by Tim & Eric or Mr. Oizo or something. (It was actually directed by Joe Broady and Kyle Whittington). Also check out "Love Buzz" and "He Hit Me".

Travis Barker & Yelawolf - "Psycho White EP" 2012

 So yeah, this happened. I just had to listen out of curiosity, and it's definitely nothing special to me, but at the same time i'd recommend it to people who already were interested in hearing a collabo like this. Most of the songs are at least decent in their execution. There's a couple missteps like the fake Sublime sounding "6 Feet Underground" which features Yelawolf and Tim Armstrong sporting some laughable fake patois and the Eminem reminiscent "Director's Cut". But  "Whistle Dixie" is OK. (Video featuring Danny Trejo). Also check out "Funky Shit" and "Push Em".

Current Value - "Crude Chronicles" 2012

This is some really hard driving music that would fall into the dubstep category, but it's more like older dubstep with constant rhythms instead of the buildup to a drop scenario that most dubstep from the last few years has had. This is some nice, blistering headphone music. Check out "Robodub", "Gonna Be Me", and "Crude Chronicles".

Daft Punk - "Random Access Memories" 2013

OK, so I finally let this album sink in, and tried to give it the benefit of the doubt, but I still just don't see what all the big fuss is about with this album. The hit single, "Get Lucky" featuring Pharrell Williams, sounds like a remix of a leftover N.E.R.D. song. It's not terrible, but it's just typical Pharrell stuff with different keyboards. I look at this album as being neither good or bad, it's just right in this mid-range blah territory, where it works good for background music, but it's really sort of boring when listening to this album is the entire focus of what you're doing. In different ways it reminds me of wanting to listen to other stuff I enjoy much more, such as Air and Black Moth Super Rainbow. Especially Air. Quite a few of these songs come off to me as Air-lite in structure, sound, and feel. It gets a little better to me towards the end of the album, but this is still just only an OK album to me. Check out "Beyond", "Instant Crush" featuring Julian Casablancas, "Giorgio By Moroder", and "Doin It Right" featuring Panda Bear.

Ty Segall - "Ty Rex 2" 2013

This was a Record Store Day release, and it's just him doing 2 T.Rex covers... and it's pretty awesome. Check out "Cat Black" and "The Motivator".