Short Attention Span Record Reviews Apr 2021 Vol. II

THE LOUDER STUFF

THE ARMED – Ultrapop
Sort of like Dillinger Escape Plan meets Genghis Tron. (7)

BONGZILLA – Weedsconsin
Listening to this album gave me some serious munchies, and I haven’t even touched the stuff in ages. (7)

DYLAN CARLSON & LORI GOLDSTON – Feral Angel
Carlson is the guy from Earth, Goldston is the cellist you know from Nirvana’s “MTV Unplugged”. No surprise this sounds like Earth with cello. (7)

GRETA VAN FLEET – The Battle At Garden's Gate
Making fun of these guys is as easy as shooting fish in a barrel but really, it’s not that bad if you don’t mind everything sounding like Rush doing a decent Led Zeppelin impression. (6)

MUSTASCH – A Final Warning - Chapter 1
21 minutes of hairy hard rock. (7)

JEFF ROSENSTOCK – Ska Dream
Rosenstock’s excellent 2020 album “No Dream” made the Music Geek’s Top-10 last year, and he just surprise-dropped a ska version of it! Ska is so uncool that this is pretty cool. (7)

THE TREATMENT – Waiting For Good Luck
(Big AC/DC verses) + (Big Def Leppard choruses) - (the Big production) = (7)


THE OTHER STUFF

RHIANNON GIDDENS & FRANCESCO TURRISI – They’re Calling Me Home
Recording in lockdown with her partner in life and music, Giddens looks into a centuries-long tradition to explore the concept of home. (8)

CORY HANSON – Pale Horse Rider
A simply fantastic psychedelic country record, like 1996 Radiohead doing a Gram Parsons tribute album. (8)

DAMON LOCKS & BLACK MONUMENT ENSEMBLE – Now
Afrobeat and gospel-infused experimental jazz, this is probably the blackest black music can get. (8)

PARKER MILLSAP – Be Here Instead
A singer-songwriter’s singer-songwriter on his 5th strong album. (8)

PEGGY SEEGER – First Farewell
Folk royalty bids us farewell after a career spanning seven decades. This is a beautiful album, full of warm and funny original songs. (8)

ESPERANZA SPALDING – Triangle EP
Three meditative vocal jazz exercises by Spalding and her band, perfect for these times. (8)

SHARON VAN ETTEN – Epic Ten
For the 10th anniversary reissue of her second album “Epic”, Van Etten invites a very eclectic mix of her influences and peers (from Fiona Apple to IDLES) to cover the whole thing and the result is, well, epic. (8)