RECORDSMusic Reviews - v15n4
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RICK ROSS
Trilla
Def Jam/Slip and Slide
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 If you “nerd out” on hip-hop like I do, then you know how fun it is to pick which city will be the new epicenter for commercial rap each year. Atlanta, St. Louis, Houston, Oakland, and Chicago have all been temporary homes for the ghetto’s CNN. Now it’s looking like rap has gone on permanent vacation back to Florida. Somehow a state whose greatest musical exports of the last decade have been Deicide and Rabbit in the Moon is now responsible for every good song on Hot 97. Pitbull, Sean Kingston, Brisco, Flo Rida, and of course our boy T-Pain are all repping for the Sunshine State, but the New Luther Campbell Award has to go to Rick Ross. I know it’s been a while since “Hustlin’” became a street anthem and an interoffice punch line, but the Boss is back with the follow-up to 2006’s suburban-certified Port of Miami. On this record Ross’s patented sluggish flow is highlighted by the best production money can buy and guest appearances by everyone good. Trilla’s coke raps are exactly what hip-hop needs after a Lupe Fiasco-packed fourth quarter.
MICHAEL THUGLESS |
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 When I was in sixth grade I had lines in my eyebrows and wore silk shirts with Z Cavaricci overalls. My friends and I would make up dance routines in front of a giant mirror in my basement, then go to school dances and dazzle the ladies with our synchronized Roger Rabbit. Most of our moves were lifted directly from Heavy D and the Boyz—I jocked those guys so hard. That summer, Trouble T. Roy, my favorite Boy, died after falling off a balcony or something. I was honestly bummed out. Maybe it was because I thought that it would break up the group or it meant we would have to start dancing like Bell Biv DeVoe, I don’t know. Shortly after Trouble’s death, Pete Rock and CL Smooth released an epic tribute called “They Reminisce Over You (T.R.O.Y),” which became an instant classic and helped me get through the tragedy. Long story short: It’s too bad Pete Rock will never make another song as good as that one.
KARL KANI |
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The B-52s! Funplex! How cute are they? They’ve sounded exactly the same for 32 freakin’ years and it’s awesome. I know back when “Love Shack” came out it got real annoying real quick, but go to YouTube and watch the video again—for some reason it totally rules now. They look like so much wacky fun. They’re just, like, cool grown-ups with amazing wardrobes having fun. Don’t you wanna be like them when you grow up?
MEG SNEED |
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SEX VID
Nests
Dom America |
More dark, sketchy dirt-thrash from these mountain-dwelling weirdos. Three tracks total: two quick face-stabbers and a dirge on the B-side called “Tapped Out” that extracts the worst bits from “Damaged” and “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and smashes their faces together in the toilet. Now that every partycore unit is scrambling for bragging rights on how far underground they roll, I’m psyched that a crew like Sex Vid exists to chase them back out of the cave. Hopefully they break up before the dreaded “concept album” stage, which has yet to NOT be the death knell of a band’s interestingness. Fingers crossed for an early death!
MYSKINAND HAIRBURNS |
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HATE ETERNAL
Fury & Flames
Metal Blade |
Erik Rutan is not a musician. He is actually some kind of prehistoric head-eating primate with a mutated adrenal gland that bestows nth level mindless ferocity. These long-haired dudes obviously keep him chained to a boulder somewhere in Florida and whip him with barbed wire whenever they need songs for a new record. That’s the only explanation for how this band keeps embarrassing all others by raising the bar for sheer mind-blurring barbarism in death metal. However, I have seen enough movies to know that eventually Rutan is going to escape and kill thousands before being recaptured, so you may want to skip visiting grandpa this year. He may be dead already.
RONAN THE ACCUSER |
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THE WEIGHT
Are Men
The Colonel Records |
While there’s certainly no shortage of classic-rock/Americana revival bands in New York these days, there is a dearth of the enthusiasm that made any of that shit worth a damn in the first place. If what you’re offering up is sun-soaked, beer-loving classic rock, then all I’m asking is songs that make me want to crack a Bud in the backyard at 2 PM. The Weight have the excitement and the drawl to make everyone else sound like they’re reading off cue cards.
MARK PRICE |
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MAN MAN
Rabbit Houses
Anti |
OK, look: We’ve spent plenty of time in these pages shitting on Philadelphia, but you know what? It’s a fucking city, an address for people to get mail sent to—who cares? Yeah, a bunch of ding-dongs live there, but name a major metropolitan center without its fair share of assholes. That’s why this record pains us so. Being “eccentric” is a good way to get views on YouTube or have your family use a word other than “loser” when describing you to others. But when you try and turn it into a band, not so much. And I know picking apart press releases is the ultimate fish-in-a-barrel move, but I just wanted to make sure you know that if you do go to a Man Man show you will see a “hipster chaining up his fixie out front.” We tried, Philly. We really did.
MATEEN CLEEVES |
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CLINIC
Do It!
Domino |
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BORIS
Smile
Southern Lord
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I have no idea what the fuck is going on here but this thing rules. Something like seven or eight musical genres are represented simultaneously, each one with a huge Omar-style scar carved across its face. Whatever you thought about these guys just got tossed out the window, so either get into it or go on with your cool niche-happy self. The rest of us are going to be excitedly dissecting this for the next couple of years.
ROM SPACEKNIGHT |
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LOST LOCKER COMBO
Freshman Orientation
Whoa-Oh |
LLC is a concept band dreamed up by Maximum Rock and Roll’s Bill Florio, where every song evokes some kind of scholastic/educational theme. If you think overexplaining it ruins the joke, wrong—the joke ruins the joke. And that’s the funny part. See, there’s multilayered retardation and cleverness that can be peeled back, but underneath everything are actually six or seven above-average pop-punk songs that I really want to hate but actually like a lot.
DAVEY SPAZZFIELD |
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LAIR OF THE MINOTAUR
War Metal Battle Master
Southern Lord |
We’ve hit the point where metal songs about epic battles and mythical beasts are more tired than rap lyrics about money and hustling and it’s fucking boring. At least most of those rappers are actually rich and probably dealt drugs at some point. Pretty sure these fellas from Chicago haven’t spent much time warring with battle-axes, though something tells me they probably took Intro to Greek Mythology and might just have extensive comic-book collections in their (mom’s) basements.
BOB HURLEY |
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AWESOME COLOR
Electric Aborigines
Ecstatic Peace |
This is probably what all those post-grunge alterna-bands like Staind and Our Lady Peace thought they were making when they were recording their yodeling, overproduced abortions—a contemporary version of everything that was good about 70s rock, divested of its damp polyester trappings and lacquered in a glossy coat of distortion. I guess there but for the grace of ten years and 40 or 50 IQ points go these guys.
LOUIS FILL |
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BLACK KEYS
Attack and Release
Nonesuch |
Some of these songs were supposed to be collaborations with Ike Turner. That would have been less boring. I’m sorry, I’ve got nothing. I have more thoughts on lentil soup.
KEITH JENNINGS |
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And with this, Clinic have finally crossed the whisper-thin line dividing “having a distinctive sound” from “recording the same album three times in a row.” Good job, fellas. Is it ironic that a bunch of guys dressed as surgeons have never dealt with the fact that their singer is suffering from a decade-long case of lockjaw?
BOOS MACKLETON |
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Meic is sometimes called the “Welsh Dylan” and has spent the past 30 years putting out unpronounceable albums of gloomy, traditional folk in that zany language of theirs (1977’s Gog is both the best and funniestly named). This one, however, is his attempt to break into the English-speaking market on the heels of such equally cerebral countrymen as Tom Jones and Tammy. The music’s not bad, but there’s something sort of vicariously embarrassing about the whole outing, like spotting your dad’s car outside the OTB or listening to Big Audio Dynamite. Also, isn’t Dylan Thomas technically the Welsh Dylan?
A HUMORLESS NERD |
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BOREDOMS
Super Roots 9
Thrill Jockey
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Once they were mysterious and obscure, now they are everywhere and perhaps, just perhaps, getting bloated with power. I mean, this thing sounds like 40 minutes of a children’s church choir doing warm-up scales followed by panic-attack-inducing drums and horror-movie chase music. I am verrrrry tempted to call bullshit. Still, I feel like all my years of accumulating cool points will be revoked if I dare say anything bad about the Boredoms, so hooray, Boredoms!
FRANCES SCHOLNICK |
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JARBOE / JUSTIN K. BROADRICK
J2
The End |
Spectacular as this is, I will admit to fantasizing what it would have been like for mid-1980s Jarboe to team up with early-1990s, Streetcleaner-era Broadrick. Although it would probably would be a situation like communism or Alien vs. Predator: awesome in theory, but a handful of random humans would get involved and fuck it up for no reason. That said, J2 is intensely brain-churning and guaranteed to cure a sunny day in one listen. Put it on at bedtime so you can wake up in tears, then spend all day feeling purged and rejuvenated. Or just take a laxative. What am I, a nutritionist?
GAY PARKER JR. |
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CLOUDLAND CANYON
Lie in Light
Kranky |
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NADJA
Skin Turns to Glass
The End
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Some possible scenarios that might require me to listen to a Nadja CD: 1) I deliberately attempt to give myself motion sickness. 2) I conduct an experiment where I try to get my pets to commit suicide. 3) I go on a long trip and become homesick for the sounds of my dishwasher. 4) I get a sudden urge to have a really bad time. Until one of these situations comes to pass, it’s impossible to review this fairly. So for now I’ll just say it’s a pile of barf and will revise later as necessary. OK with you?
SASSYCAKE CUPSTEIN |
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SCARLETT JOHANSSON
Anywhere I Lay My Head
Atco |
Fuck it, I’m giving this a smiley. Yes, she is a 100 percent tone-deaf celebrity putting out a vanity project à la such past tasteful silver-screen chanteuses as Milla Jovovich or Minnie Driver, but, my God, it’s an entire album of Tom Waits covers, people. And there’s drum machines and ethereal chimes everywhere and they’ve hidden her deadpan voice (half Liz Phair, half Will Ferrell as Robert Goulet, and just a sliver more pleasant than Tom Waits himself) under so many effects and echoes and fuzzy layers of gunk to try and make her seem on-key, that, call me crazy, the sheer audacity of it all fills me with an evil sort of glee. I’m filing this proudly next to my CD of Tina Yothers’s band, Jaded.
LANITA SICKS |
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In a world where “atmospheric” and “spacey” are bywords for “milking a single chord progression for over an hour,” it is more than a pleasant surprise to see a Yank and a Kraut team up and rip out a spacey, atmospheric album full of stuff that changes, like with actual separate parts. It is a rabbit punch in the upper arm while you’re sleeping. These guys and Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band are the only folks left making 8- to 15-minute songs that couldn’t be pulled off in 2.
CARRIE HAMM |
COMMENTS
Anonymous, on Sep 6, 2008 wrote:
lawllll! | | Anonymous, on Aug 17, 2008 wrote:
Hahaha, honkie man got mad ’cause his platter sounds like crap. Rootsreggae is old, old, old. And the inventors are dead dead dead. That is why a honkioutfit like yours get to play the oldies-revival-circuit. But it is nice that you have a hobby! | | Anonymous, on Jul 17, 2008 wrote:
To MEIASE VON HALLWYL
Just to set the record straight - the only references to Jamaica or Jahmade on the album come from Bamma B (Trinidad and Tobago) and Elijah Prophet (Jamaica). Right now we have, as the first European rootsband ever, been invited to promote our music in Jamaica through radio, TV, papers and live shows. So, apparently, our music "floats the roots boat" of some prominent people in the heart of reggae-country. I don’t usually respond to reviews, good or bad, but it seems to me that the reviews of this magazine are only meant to be provocative. Make sure your vomit won’t stain yourselves when it hits the ground. | | Anonymous, on Jun 24, 2008 wrote:
Fuck! Are these reviews just trying to make us all feel inadequate for liking music that is perfectly normal and in many cases good? It’s like you hipsters have some mad superiority complex just because you can put up with listening to weird, arcane noise longer than us. | |
| bonerdreamz69, on Jun 17, 2008 wrote:
wow, yeah, they really should have taken that May news story about Crystal Castles into account when they were writing their April reviews. | | Anonymous, on Jun 14, 2008 wrote:
you suck vice | |
Date: May 28 2008 01:28:58 AM
Author: mk
more smiley faces than usual, which is strange considering there hasn't been a good album released in at least 6 months. but i guess it's a little easier to appreciate a punch in the guts after you've had 17 kicks in the balls
Date: May 18 2008 06:55:41 PM
Author: Wow you guys are tools...
Plagiarism Rocks! And Crystal Castles is all about it.
gamemusic4all.blogspot.com/2008/05/crystal-castles-caugh
t-stealing-music.html />
Date: May 16 2008 12:34:35 PM
Author: Junie
It's actually Rabbit Habits
Philadelphia aside, I think it's a badass album
Date: May 15 2008 08:43:30 PM
Author: Bibliotheque
scarlett johansson is barely an actress and now she's fucking covering tom waits? what's next, winona ryder doing robert wyatt?
Date: May 05 2008 09:48:25 PM
Author: ..
Hey, at least he doesn't like Man Man.
Date: May 05 2008 09:23:56 PM
Author: bob log
Oh well, you're so smart sir. I stand corrected. Now I see how that makes that album review the greatest achievement in Vice literary history. :rolls eyes:
That so called "review" is the most boring senseless dribble, out of a long series of dribble that has sputtered out of Vice.
Date: Apr 28 2008 11:47:03 AM
Author: jackanapes
You boys from Man Man need to learn to read more carefully. That part about "hipster locking his bike up" is from the album's press release. As in, Mateen Cleaves didn't write it, either the band or their publicist did and thought it was the best way to advertise their music. Hence the quote marks and the whole preceeding line about picking apart press releases.
Date: Apr 28 2008 12:29:22 AM
Author: bob log
I'm not one to normally be defenders of Man Man but how stupid is that fricking album review by Mateen Cleaves? Dude, you write music reviews for fricking Vice magazine, yet you criticize a band just because they're eccentric "hipsters" from a city you don't like. Dude you work for Vice. Don't you see the irony? You're the biggest hipster doofus possible and from a city so insanely superficial it hurts.
Date: Apr 27 2008 02:22:51 PM
Author: xccbdkcvwe
so for the man man review, you honestly don't like them because a hipster may be locking up his bike outside of the show? what are you? that is the worst reason to not like an album I have ever heard.
Date: Apr 21 2008 01:46:17 PM
Author: april5k
one time i was meeting some work people at buffalo wild wings and when i left i put on all of Vision Creation Newsun (it cost like six bux or something b/c it had to download, but i'd like to think it was worth it) on that digital internet jukebox they have. i don't know what happened after i left but i felt pretty good about myself.
Date: Apr 20 2008 01:05:08 PM
Author: ghb
this was terrible. used to be the best part of vice (better than the dos i thought). how come it takes the new writers 16 lines to be 1/8th as funny as the old ones were in 2??
Date: Apr 20 2008 02:33:32 AM
Author: Jakob-Tim
Viceland writers, creators, or enforcing officers, to whom this may concern:
Dear Viceland Magazine,
I was reading these reviews. Month to month I have seen issues and assorted genres a review of all things music. The importance to the music review cannot be an understatement, it is UNDER rated at all, if nothing else, anything, to be said. Of all I came to say this, I love the music reviewing each compact discs! Simply, it is important to have a knowledge that new music comes forth! Although that has been said above, let me say, I do not know to trust all the opinions are had. Reasoning me is behind the factual possible the wild nature of choice review causers. Each review had a different ridicule came to me as a doubtful resource of to my trust. Trusting the guys called Myskin and Hairburns, at first, but how does he call himself names that or such as anything... like a humorless nerd is not a name. It was to be funny for a reading man of this as important reviewing, but still not as much as a taken for concerned understanding knowledge, above all else. Serious as I take it, how do you, name guys as such as normal Mateen Cleeves, or other normal ones. A name like Jason Crombie, side-by-side to a no sense fellow mate. to mix up someones thoughts or reasoning? Myskin and Hairburns....my skin and hair burns. Did you so much as take to notice that, to the editor? Finally I am ending my note. Ok, final thanks for some, but still a sharp notice to take to you! For all you here, Bye men folk. Keep up working good for us lonely to read it!
From: Jakob-Tim
Date: Apr 19 2008 05:55:24 PM
Author: drsnooglez
the reviews editor hasent changed, and even if she had i dont think she writes every single record review. i also happened to discover thedeathset thanks to this months reviews and they're like my favorite band now so eat me
Date: Apr 19 2008 04:50:31 PM
Author: SCARELTT JOHANSSON
YOU ASSHOLES MISSPELLED SCARLETT JOHANSSON. FUCK ALL Y'ALL.
Date: Apr 19 2008 03:43:43 PM
Author: glaring omission
How the fuck could you dudes pass over Torche's new album Meanderthal?! I don't even like metal but this record has such wide-appeal catchiness combined with brutal heaviness that it might never leave my car cd player.
Date: Apr 19 2008 11:38:45 AM
Author: wweqq
i stopped reading after they said "the weight" is a good band. because their a bad parody of 70s "country rock" they took their name from the band and took their outfits from the flying burrito brothers.
Date: Apr 19 2008 11:06:03 AM
Author: whatever
If you are caught up on disagreeing with the reviews or shitting on who is on their record label, you're probably an idiot. This is one of their funniest features. Expect the anthology in late 2009.
Date: Apr 19 2008 10:50:52 AM
Author: no
"they" didn't hire someone new. same reviews editor it's been for years.
Date: Apr 19 2008 09:58:39 AM
Author: heyheyhey!
They did hire someone new. A "music editor". And this is from the crew who "gave" us the Streets, arctic Donkeys and other "New and exciting" artists....
Date: Apr 19 2008 08:28:23 AM
Author: vice downhill
wow. worst record reviews section vice has ever done and this comes from someone who most times agrees with the reviews.
did you hire a new record reviewer? maybe an 11 year old kid whos convinced hes a genius but no one else realizes it?????????????????????
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