Alternative Music Blog

Death Vessel sounds like the name of a marauding metal combo. And, given the flowing mane of DV main-man Joel Thibodeau, immediate metal misconceptions are given a vote of tonsorial confidence. But even the briefest of listens to Death Vessel reveals something most un-metal.

Thibodeau plays gentle, folksy songs, preferring a more delicate aesthetic than turning things up to 11. And the tiny man with the big hair has one distinctive musical quirk: his voice. Going above and beyond even Geddy Lee's dreams, Thibodeau sings in a high, clear, choirboy's voice, getting routinely mistaken for a girl.

Sub Pop recently released Thibodeau's second Death Vessel album, Nothing is Precious Enough for Us, and the songsmith is currently in the midst of run of North American shows in support of it. Before he set out a ramblin' on the road, I spoke to Thibodeau about life as Death Vessel, his new disc, and, of course, his ultra-unique voice.

Photo © [Lisa Corson]

Though their all-male membership totals naught but four strapping young Stampede City lads, Calgary quartet Women still trade by the name, uh, Women. And under the name, uh, Women, these men of the New Zero Kanada crank out some seriously delicious noise, a rattling kind of garage-psych bathed in the hum of tape-hiss.

Due for an October 7 release on the Secretly Canadian-pimped Jagjaguwar imprint, Women's self-titled debut album is all of 29 minutes long; a staunchly-rhythmic set whose bashed-out, in-the-red repetitions recall riffs ripped out on old German kraut-rock records, and by the legendary British post-punk outfit This Heat.

The LP was "produced" by fellow Calgarian Chad VanGaalen —who, not so incidentally, has a smokin' hot new platter, Soft Airplane, being served up by Sub Pop next week— over a period of four months. VanGaalen captured Women on an array of old ghetto-blasters and reel-to-reel recorders, rolling magnetic tape "in his basement, an outdoor culvert, and a crawlspace." The result is a righteous racket, and another entry in 2008's analogue-loving lo-fi revival.

Women Track List
1. "Cameras"
2. "Lawncare"
3. "Woodbine"
4. "Black Rice"
5. "Sag Harbor Bridge"
6. "Group Transport Hall"
7. "Shaking Hand"
8. "Upstairs"
9. "January 8th"
10. "Flashlights"

Photo © [Lindsey Baker]

In a move that will arouse punctuation-fetishists and annoy sub-editors everywhere, TV on the Radio's latest opus is entitled Dear Science,. Yes, that comma is inclusive. Even though the actual album artwork doesn't feature the controversial comma in question, the band have let it be known that the title must be becomma'd; the record being, if only on some conceptual level, an open letter to human understanding and the limitations of overbearing rationalism.

Though the album found producer/mastermind Dave Sitek attempting to simplify his incredibly-busy, densely-layered approach to production, the sound of TVOTR's third LP should be familiar to any fan of the band. Due for release on September 23, Dear Science, will be taken unto the people, with a run of live dates around the record's release.

Dear Science, Track List
1. "Halfway Home"
2. "Crying"
3. "Dancing Choose"
4. "Stork & Owl"
5. "Golden Age"
6. "Family Tree"
7. "Red Dress"
8. "Love Dog"
9. "Shout Me Out"
10. "DLZ"
11. "Lover's Day"

With the indie world going Swede-crazy in recent seasons, it was strange that Frida Hyvönen's utterly amazing debut album, Until Death Comes, didn't receive a more rapturous reception upon its American release in 2006. The statuesuque, Stockholm-based songstress carves savagely emotional, sexually-forthright songs out of handful of piano chords and a voice that carries the clarity and eloquence of a young Joni Mitchell, and her debut truly hailed the arrival of a fearsome new talent.

Following on from her gospel-tinged soundtrack Frida Hyvönen Gives You: Music From The Dance Performance Pudel —released last year, in Sweden, on The Concretes' great Licking Fingers label— Hyvönen will soon unveil her second LP proper, Silence is Wild, unto the world.

Coming replete with horse-themed artwork and promotional pics, the set revolves around a song called "Pony," on which Hyvönen lets loose the following vicious verse: "The stable is where you learn to be in charge and not take sh*t/ Dressed to the occasion: leather boots and a stiff black whip."

Recorded by longtime Concretes associate Jari Haapalainen, Hyvönen's whipsmart new gear swaps the musical/lyrical starkness of her debut for a sprawling orchestral grandeur. Secretly Canadian gives you the free taste of Silence is Wild via the legal acquisition of "The Enemy Within," in advance of the album's eagerly-awaited November 4 release.

Brooklyn's Gang Gang Dance have made some of the most beautifully-bizarre, ridiculously-good, totally-off-the-dial music of the past decade. All that's been missing is the classic album to cement that status. 2005's spiraling God's Money was close, but it may be the forthcoming Saint Dymphna that officially cements Gang Gang Dance's reputation.

Born from the same Brooklyn scene that gave the world Animal Collective and Black Dice —not to mention inspired 2008's crossover kings MGMT and Yeasayer— Gang Gang Dance bash out a fantastic mish-mash of distorted, half-crumbling synth sounds, ricocheting percussion, and the whooping and wailing voice of Lizzie Bougatsos. Liberally mixing all manner of different musics into one singular study in rhythm, Gang Gang Dance sound in thrall to superstitious primitivism and scientific revelation at once.

Due for release on October 21 (on New York's cult-ish The Social Registry in North America, and via iconic electro label Warp through Europe and Australasia), Saint Dymphna is loaded with dancefloor potential, promising a beautiful beat-orgy that may turn out to be one of 2008's most transcendent sets.

Saint Dymphna Track List:
1. "Holy Communion"
2. "Blue Nile"
3. "Vacuum"
4. "Princes"
5. "Inners Pace"
6. "Afoot"
7. "House Jam"
8. "Interlude (No Known Home)"
9. "Desert Storm"
10. "Dust"

Photo © [Josh Wildman]

The white-coat clad retrophonic modular-pop boffins of Stereolab have recently unleashed their ninth longplaying experiment, Chemical Chords; another charmed set of synth-splattering bleeps, bloops, blips, and drips. In honor of such, I recently spoke to the Groop's iconic vocalist, Laetitia Sadier, about the state of Stereolab (and, um, the hyper-capitalist model of modern society) circa 2008. You are permitted to partake of said conversation.

In support of Chemical Chords, Stereolab will be taking the high-road around North America for a month of autumnal performances, starting late-September. For neophytes or longtime ’Lab-lovers alike, it'll provide a prime opportunity to check in on one of the indie realm's most perennially on-it outfits.

Photo © [Sabrina Tabuchi]

Deerhunter —the Atlanta, Georgia-based band fronted by the infamous Bradford Cox— have announced the details of their forthcoming third LP, Microcastle. The follow-up to 2007's well-regarded Cryptograms is due to be dispatched unto the world on October 28, on Kranky Records in North America, but on the legendary 4AD label round the rest of the world.

This is fortuitous, for it seems that each release will bear different artwork. On purely aesthetic grounds, we'd have to hail the suitably-tasteful 4AD version (above) as far superior to the clamorous Kranky version (below).

Musically speaking, Microcastle marks a departure from Deerhunter's space-rock roots; the sprawling, wall-of-sound jams exchanged for shorter, sweet, less distorted pop-songs. With Cox funneling some of that drone-loving into his increasingly-permanent side-project Atlas Sound, it seems to have left Deerhunter free to make a more 'straight up' record.

Deerhunter will be roadtesting the new material with a run of dates both before and after the record's release, including a slew of shows supporting Nine Inch Nails.

Microcastle Track List
1. "Cover Me (Slowly)"
2. "Agoraphobia"
3. "Never Stops"
4. "Little Kids"
5. "Microcastle"
6. "Calvary Scars"
7. "Green Jacket"
8. "Activa"
9. "Nothing Ever Happened"
10. "Saved By Old Times"
11. "Neither Of Us, Uncertainly"
12. "Twilight At Carbon Lake"

For the prolific artist, the quickness and ease of issuing music in a digital format must feel like a welcome release. Richard Swift is described by his record label, Secretly Canadian, as "a long-in-the-tooth impresario of all not-a-computer." And, sure enough, his continuing retreat into the primitive pop-song sounds of half-a-century ago suggest a recidivist's heart beats deep within his hefty bosom. But digital-dissemination befits the prolific, inventive, genre-juggling songsmith.

In 2008, Swift has already issued an album under his side-project nom-de-disque Instruments of Science and Technology, as well as a playful 'double EP' of proto-rhythm-and-blues called Richard Swift As Onasis. Keeping the onslaught coming, Swift is now releasing a download-only EP entitled Ground Trouble Jaw.

Recorded, in part, at Wilco's studio (or 'loft space,' as it were) in Chicago, it continues Swift's recent exercises in genre recreationism and old-fashioned tape-recording techniques. Of course, these jukebox-friendly, old-soul-centric sounds make Ground Trouble Jaw a slightly anachronistic a digital-only release.

Still, it's hard to argue with the cost: nada! The five-song set is available for virtual thievin' here. And, as an added, totally new-millennial blessing, there's a suite of Swift-made 'short films' that serve as a kind of making-of, ready to be witnessed right here.

Photo © [Paul Heartfield]

This decade, from Parades to AIDS, Wolves have been at the top of the band-name animal totem. Yet, with the recent arrival of White Rabbits, 7 Year Rabbit Cycle, and Frightened Rabbit on the pop-cultural radar, will Le Loup give way to Le Lapin? Are the Rabbits afoot? “Sure, it’s only three, but three’s enough, right?” laughs Scott Hutchison, frontman of Frightened Rabbit. “We’re the start of the revolution.”

Frightened Rabbit have been finding increasing acclaim, of recent, for their particular brand of intense, emotional guitar-rock. Born in tiny Selkirk but now based in Glasgow, the band took their animal-themed handle from Hutchison's mother, who told her young son that social situations brought on a 'frightened rabbit look' in him.

Hutchison is clearly still plagued by social unease, the recently released The Midnight Organ Fight, finding the vocalist playing the embittered, desperate ex-. That confessional nature has attracted like-hearted fans to the band. "Ever since I’ve been in this band, people have come up to me," says Hutchison. "They feel like they connect with me, that they know me, because they’ve listened to my songs. So they’re, in turn, pretty open with their own lives with me. They feel like they can talk to me about stuff, about their problems.”

And Hutchison gives them sage advice? “I’d never offer advice,” he chuckles. “The main irony about that would be that I wrote an album about how I’m unable to deal with relationships. People just want to talk. And, hopefully, those people that do meet me should hopefully realise that I’m not cunty like that all day. I’m just like that in my songs.”

Photo © [Christopher Heaney]

Kevin Barnes' gleeful psych-funk jamboree Of Montreal broke out of the twee-pop underground in a big way with 2006's Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer? The eighth album for the Athens, Georgia-based collective was, certainly, their first to have ever bothered Billboard. Debuting at #72 on the big-boys chart, the ridiculously enjoyable disc showed Of Montreal crossing over to find a whole new audience for Barnes' cross-dressing retro-pop mayhem.

Polyvinyl Records have recently announced details of Of Montreal's much awaited follow-up. LP#9 shall be entitled Skeletal Lamping, and promises to lure even more listeners into Barnes' lurid lair. Barnes has described the record as an attempt "to create something that was, in turns, enraging, joyous, discomforting, playful, lovely, unpleasant, freaky, [and] mesmeric."

Due to be released on October 7, the disc holds the eternal promise of the unknown. And interest is only piqued by Barnes' sentiments on the authoring of his forthcoming work. "I am so bored with art that makes sense and 'works,'" he says. "I wanted to do something that didn't 'work'."

Skeletal Lamping Track List
1. "Nonpareil of Favor"
2. "Wicked Wisdom"
3. "For Our Elegant Caste"
4. "Touched Something's Hollow"
5. "An Eluardian Instance"
6. "Gallery Piece"
7. "Women's Studies Victims"
8. "St.Exquisite's Confessions"
9. "Triphallus, to Punctuate!"
10. "And I've Seen a Bloody Shadow"
11. "Plastis Wafers"
12. "Death Is Not a Parallel Move"
13. "Beware Our Nubile Miscreants"
14. "Mingusings"
15. "Id Engager"

Photo © [Jim Newberry]