The Parties - Can't Come Down - 2008

There's a graceful psychedelic drift in the Parties' brand of jangle pop that sets them apart from the dozens of other bands that worship at the altar of Roger McGuinn, and on their first full-length album Can't Come Down, the band recalls the adventurous melodic sense of latter-day pop acts (most notably the Windbreakers) while still conjuring a pleasing retro vibe. There's an engaging push-and-pull between Jeremy Powers' ringing 12-string leads and the fuzzier bedrock of Sarah Mehlfeld's guitar figures, and the songs mine the rich melodic frameworks of classic folk-rock along with the minor-key twists of later acid-era stuff. (The rhythm section of Rex Padayhag on bass and John Morgan on drums doesn't call as much attention to itself, but they coax the music along with a gentle but insistent force.) While most of the songs glide along in a graceful midtempo, there are a few tougher sounding numbers such as "Radio," "Breaking Hearts," and "Damned by the Sunshine" that show the Parties can step on the gas when they feel like it, and the pedal steel on "Much Better" suggests these folks have been listening to their Gram Parsons records. But Can't Come Down is at its best when the Parties follow their psychedelic muse, like the Left Banke without the Baroque trappings or the Rain Parade stripped of their studied cool, and it makes for a quietly impressive debut from a band that can look to the past without sounding as if they're selling paisley nostalgia. -AMG



The Parties - Can't Come Down - 2008/rs
or
The Parties - Can't Come Down - 2008/sb

The New Fidelity - Tiny Slivers - 2007

The New Fidelity creates their own brand of 60's influenced Mod Power Pop which helps them shine through the smog of Southern California's indie rock sprawl. The NewFi takes the stage in well-tailored suits and play well-tailored songs about real things.
Taking a heap of Britain ala Small Faces, Who and Beatles with a cupful of soul by way of Motown and Stax, adding a dash of punk from the Clash and the Jam, The New Fidelity uses tight vocal harmonies and upbeat rhythm to make their audiences want to get up and dance.
Using Long Beach as a base of operations gives the NewFi access to all of Southern California allowing them to secure residencies from Safari Sam's club in Hollywood down to the Detroit Bar in Costa Mesa while playing for faces in every town in between. The NewFi can also be found at dance clubs and scooter rallies mixing it up by playing the same Mod and Soul classics that the DJs spin along with their own originals peppered in. -CD Baby



The New Fidelity - Tiny Slivers - 2007/rs
or
The New Fidelity - Tiny Slivers - 2007/sb

King Khan & The Shrines - Mr. Supernatural - 2004

Brewing up a heady mixture of high-spirited rhythm & blues, real-gone psychedelia and middle-finger-flipping garage rock, King Khan has earned an international reputation as one of the wildest showmen in underground rock. Born and raised in the suburbs of Montreal to a family of Indian émigrés, Erick Khan first made a splash on the Canadian music scene in 1996 when he joined the frantic garage punk outfit the Spaceshits, where he played bass under the name Blacksnake. The Spaceshits released three albums and a handful of 7"s, but after nearly four years with the group, Khan opted to strike out on his own, relocating to Germany following a tour of Europe. Adopting the new stage name King Khan, he began assembling a solo act while also recording and touring with former Spaceshits vocalist Mark Sultan (aka Bridge Mixture and BBQ), cutting a pair of albums as the King Khan & BBQ Show. King Khan & His Sensational Shrines (the "Sensational" part tends to come and go at will) made their recorded debut on a split single with Reverend Beat-Man & the Nonbelievers in 2001, followed by the EP Spread Your Love Like Peanut Butter and the album Three Hairs and You're Mine. King Khan's band grew all the while and took on a number of remarkable personalities, including Ron Streeter, a percussionist who spent years touring with Curtis Mayfield and Stevie Wonder; Ben Ra, a German sax player who worships at the altar of John Coltrane and Sun Ra; Freddy Rococo, a French organ player who previously led a one-man band in drag; and Bamboorella, the Shrines' full-time go-go dancer. After cutting a split LP with the Dirtbombs, Billiards at Nine Thirty, Khan and the Shrines released their second full-length album, 2004's Mr. Supernatural. -AMG



King Khan & The Shrines - Mr. Supernatural - 2004/rs
or
King Khan & The Shrines - Mr. Supernatural - 2004/sb

Fom the Vault: Old pan shots and shiz

Well I went through some of my old pics and was able to put together some pan shots of some walls from a few places I've documented over the last few years. For the most part they came out OK, although there are some lighting issues and a few disjoints here and there. Here are some pans from TA Wall & Factory, Stinky's, St. Catherine's Street, the Plateau, and a few other areas and events. Hopefully they came out alright.

**I fixed all the links on these pics so they are fully viewable now**

Here's a section of the lower TA Wall from May 2009 featuring Bfor, Kemo, and Scan. Crazy Apes Crew did a monster prodution just to the right of it that I have a little ways lower on this post.


This is section of the MOS wall just off of Bleury taken in January 2007. This work was done for MOS 2006. The pic is a little blurry off to the right as I was still shooting with my hand held digi at the time and not every pic was crisp. reading from top left around right and back to bottom left we got: F.One, Ewol, Sewer, Nixon, Nesar, Fomer, Dock, and Loes.

Here's another section of wall from MOS 2006 (photo taken in Jan 2007 again) featuring (from top left around to bottom left) Zek, Tyke, Dfek, Ekon, Striker, Sick(156), Shok, and Stack. The last one on the end I do not know. But some solid painting here that's for sure.


Another wall from MOS 2006, just to the left of the one above featuring Bez and Striker in the first section, Tchug and Astro in the second, and a few in the final section that I am unsure of as of yet.


Here's an oldie, this production used to be up in an alley way just off of Concordia on Mackay Street. This production had been up for a while, it was a really nice piece of work that featured Stare, Omen, Pener, Skan, Cemz, Fatso, and Cameo. There were others involved in this one I believe but I I'm not sure yet who they were.

This is a production I found while trucking around the east end of Montreal in 2007.

Scien and Astro from 2006 in Outremont area.

This is a section of the upper TA Wall from 2006 featuring a couple I don't know, but second from left is Sober, then Nixon, and at the end is Saer.

Here's that mad toxic production by Crazy Apes Crew that I photographed at the lower TA Wall in May earlier this year. Running from left to right: Beta, Fezat, Lith, Havok, and Mystx. Solid production by some very talented writers.

Here's another pan from the lower TA Wall featuring some nice work by Stack and Ether and then

Tyke and Shok.

This is a Trife Life production that was just off of St Catherine's street I took in 2006: Dfek, Zek, Life, Ether, and Shok.

Finally, here is a pan shot of a section of Stinky's that I took in April of this year. I thought that this was an interesting use of the structure by Bubz who had painted on a number of disjointed characters across a large section of the abandoned area. I particularly like the birds and have seen then in various locations throughout the city this year.

I'll post more pan shots when I get around to putting them together. I got some stuff from Turcot, more from the TA Wall and Factory, Stinky's, and a few other places.

You Am I - Convicts - 2006

The Australian juggernaut's first release in four years is a short (36-minute), sharp and succinct collection that continues the band's snappy punk-pop attack. Despite the group's illustrious history, at least in its homeland where the act has set a record for three consecutive number one albums since 1992, this is old-fashioned, scrappy garage rock with enough snotty punk influences to attract the hardcore faithful and plenty of melody to possibly coax some radio play from stations that added Green Day to their play lists. The disc explodes out of the gate with the roughed up, double time "Thank God I've Hit the Bottom," all one-minute-and-fifty-one seconds of it, but then catches its breath with a slightly more restrained but no less intense Cheap Trick-styled rocker "It Ain't Funny How We Don't Talk Anymore." Singer/songwriter/vocalist Tim Rogers' clever lyrics are firmly in place and he inserts them in songs that occasionally bring Give 'Em Enough Rope-era Clash influences to his established Replacements' style song structures. The Who and the Kinks are further references, the latter on slower selections such as the strummy "Secrets," the following track "Thuggery" and especially the Brit-pop-isms of "Explaining Cricket." Consistently energetic playing, sturdy hooks and Rogers' spunky talk-singing -- somewhat like an angrier Tom Petty -- propel these songs and push them past their obvious influences. Straightforward yet effective vocal harmonies on simple Stonesy rockers such as "The Sweet Life" (at four-minutes-and-twenty seconds, it's the album's longest tune) show the band's maturity even when the melodies are rudimentary. Individually, the songs probably won't bowl you over, at least on the initial listen, but the overall effect is of a seasoned yet still brash rock band doing its job with verve, self-confidence and gusto. Even 14 years into its existence, You Am I is capable of some surprises, but most impressive is how much they sound like edgy guys in their early twenties who love and live for rock & roll. At this relatively late stage of their career, that's a huge accomplishment. -AMG



You Am I - Convicts - 2006/rs
or
You Am I - Convicts - 2006/sb

MiNsTeR HiLL - MiNsTeR HiLL - 1999

Calling all XTC fans! Is two LPs a decade too little? Here's a humble protégé snack to wile away those in between-meals. This New Jersey band is actually one Howard Herrick, whose sunny-pop confections, and especially the baroque hiccup of his straining high voice, are replicas of Andy Partridge's work in the early-to-mid '80s. It recalls singles such as "Senses Working Overtime," "Love on a Farmboy's Wages," and "All You Pretty Girls." Like that English Settlement/Mummer/Big Express blueprint, Herrick's not energized enough to be new wave, nor '60s enough to be retro, but lies somewhere in that middle place, where shy lads sing like chirping birds at all the elegance and sobriety life throws. Perhaps the production is lower-budget than that of his hero's work, but there's minor, fresh-faced appeal. -AMG



MiNsTeR HiLL - MiNsTeR HiLL - 1999/rs
or
MiNsTeR HiLL - MiNsTeR HiLL - 1999/sb

El Goodo - El Goodo - 2006

Although Welsh psych-pop outfit El Goodo don't sound a bit like Big Star, the fact that they nicked their name from an old cult fave tune is illuminating: there is nothing about El Goodo that any reasonably knowledgeable student of pop history hasn't heard before. That said, the first-names-only quintet do a better job than most of synthesizing enough disparate influences that it doesn't sound like they're just ripping off one band in particular. The wry "Stuck in the '60s" says it all, really: faux Beach Boys vocals, queasy strings out of a Serge Gainsbourg record, a Mellotron part straight from the opening of "Strawberry Fields Forever," Forever Changes' mariachi trumpets, but all of them are brought together by a solid, hooky melody and a knowing lyric that says "Yes, we know we're not really doing anything new here." Other highlights include the accordion-powered waltz "I Tried But I Failed," which has unexpected echoes of Ram-era Paul McCartney, and the sweet-tooth psychedelia of the jangle-fuzzy "Surreal Morning," complete with backwards guitar solo. Blending the druggily experimental vibe of the Beta Band or El Goodo's friends and patrons Super Furry Animals with the kind of retro songcraft the Apples in Stereo mastered on Fun Trick Noisemaker and Tone Soul Evolution, this is strictly for those who like to play spot-the-homage, but the group's better than average songwriting and clear fondness for their obvious influences make this an enjoyable listen. -AMG



El Goodo - El Goodo - 2006/rs
or
El Goodo - El Goodo - 2006/sb