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\nThe Catz in the Hatz<\/b>, \u201c\u201dTake One\u201d (Catz in the Hatz Records)
\nStardust-sprinkled jazz favorites played by genial weekend warriors for the Arthur Murray set. The marketing sound-bite for this SoCal-based quintet is \u201cJazz with an attitude\u201d but with such foxtrot favorites as \u201cI\u2019ve Got You Under My Skin,\u201d \u201cIt Was a Very Good Year\u201d and a baritone re-do of Peggy Lee\u2019s \u201cFever,\u201d the attitude (and sound) is pure Tony Bennett. Steve Johnson\u2019s (place pleasant adjective here) renderings bottle every puff of smoky piano and expel a record that will please everyone from great-granny to the most recent reality-TV-inspired ballroom converts. Shirley Jones and Dawn Wells of Gilligan\u2019s Island fame are among their converts, for what it\u2019s worth.
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\nOrder from Tower Records<\/a><\/p>\n
The Renovators<\/b>, \u201cRhythm & Blueprints\u201d (Berger Platters Records) Decoded Feedback<\/b>, \u201cCombustion\u201d (Metropolis Records) Pilotdrift<\/b>, \u201cWater Sphere\u201d (Good Records) We Are Scientists<\/b>, \u201cWith Love and Squalor\u201d (Virgin Records) Baleen<\/b>, \u201cFollow Me Blind\u201d (Liquilad Records) The Bangkok Five<\/b>, “10 The Hard Way” (Aeronaut Records) Vigilante<\/b>, \u201cThe Heroes Code\u201d (Black Rain Records) Virtual Embrace<\/b>, \u201cHellektro (Alfa Matrix Records) \nTaken<\/b>, \u201cBetween Two Unseens\u201d (Goodfellow Records) Lynn Julian<\/b>, \u201cCookie Cutter Girl\u201d (Cookie Cutter Records) DBMQ<\/b>, \u201cThe Essential Sounds From the Far East\u201d (Estrus Records) Paul Armfield and the Four Good Reasons<\/b>, \u201cEvermine\u201d (Groove Attack Records) State of Being<\/b>, \u201cHaywire\u201d (Reverse Image Records) \nCubby Creatures<\/b>, \u201cAfter the Deprogramming\u201d (Rodent Records)
\nSqueaky clean DIY 12-bar with a 70s feel, Bowdlerized for church suppers but witty enough that it can\u2019t be roundfiled as empirical bar-band wankage. Bob Raseros\u2019 Don-Henley-congenital vocals make excellent use of the other proceedings, most notably on protracted honky-tonk essay \u201cThe Big One.\u201d \u201cEverybody Loves the Blues\u201d delves the furthest into old-style kegger-rock, almost to the point of picking at Blue Oyster Cult bones, not that \u201cRenovator\u2019s Boogie\u201d doesn\u2019t have its own \u201cFlirtin\u2019 With Disaster\u201d bills to pay. \u201cWho\u2019s to Blame\u201d is an obligato swipe of \u201cBlack Magic Woman\u201d but is nicely redeemed in the BB-King-like comedy \u201cIt\u2019s Been Done.\u201d Order from CD Baby<\/a><\/p>\n
\nDemon-haunted dance techno reminiscent of \u201cToo Dark Park\u201d-era Skinny Puppy (\u201cdarkwave\u201d is the genre) but a noticeable stretch friendlier in spite of Marco Blaglotti\u2019s vortex-swooshing whisper-roared vocals, which in fact he downshifts to wax Depeche-Mode-ic on the futurepoppy \u201cThat\u2019s All You Want.\u201d Although much of this is lit up with S&M grind-core, the tweeters get plenty of attention via higher-pitched synth currents (the fake bagpipes in \u201cPsy-Storm\u201d for instance), keeping this trancey ghoulishness safe for occasions other than goth-club fashion shows.
\nOrder from Industrial Music<\/a><\/p>\n
\nAn unadvisable track order puts the two most inaccessible songs up front, taken together a schizoid core-dump with more faces than Sybil \u2013 Dresden Dolls, Meatloaf and the Charlies Angels theme song are all imitated in a near-Thirlwellian trip. These were the kids who sat in the corner of the caf in high school, moving and talking in snail-time, all glassy eyes and spaceshot rant, therefore no Martian elevator music collection would be complete without \u201cBubblecraft\u201d and the valiant effort its coed voices make attempting to synch up in the face of a comical incompatibility. \u201cPassenger Seat\u201d takes a more speed-prog approach, skittering synth arpeggios fluttering around like butterflies staying just out of reach. \u201cJekyll and Hyde Suite\u201d connotes further Dresden Dolls\/Kit Kat Klub detritus paired up with funeral parlor Muzak for saucermen.
\nOrder direct from Good Records<\/a><\/p>\n
\nMuseum-quality Iran\/Contra-era pogo this diligently crafted could only have resulted from lead-man Keith Murray\u2019s having spent a grotesquely misshapen childhood diving into dumpsterfuls of scratchy Mission of Burma and Buzzcocks wax, coming up for air only for the occasional Cure chestnut (see \u201cCash Cow\u201d). Either that or these gents are the first band of 2005 to make something genuinely useful out of all the CMJ rock they\u2019ve been spoon-fed, but regardless, the album is successful in its endeavor to re-retro the 60s-retro foundations of those wild-west years when safety pins were the only fashion accessory required to prove that you were, like everyone else, different from everyone else. Bolstered with power-jangle and cloddish bass lines right out of Lords of the New Church, this is far from emo-hack; much of it would have fit in fine on a CBGB comp from 1981. [October release for the UK, January for the US] Band website<\/a><\/p>\n
\nOn the surface a genre-shy college-radio alphabet soup, Baleen are ultimately pigeonholed as boy-band emo bolstered with enough laptop know-how to encourage exasperated retailers to throw them in the general industrial section. George Carlin might take the easy way out and describe this as \u201cmeatcake\u201d \u2013 \u201cSolidify\u201d could be Tool or Boyz 2 Men, \u201c6:30 AM\u201d could be Al Jarreau or My Chemical Romance, but ultimately the unadvised high-school-band sax passages define it as an experience similar to getting stoned with your grandparents \u2013 it\u2019s cool in an odd way but there\u2019d be no regrets if you were able to avoid doing it again. Band website<\/a><\/p>\n
\nTeardrop Explodes meets Weezer nu-indie portraying a pre-nodes Rod Stewart barging in on a Maroon 5 tribute to the Pixies. Clinically neutered market-aware punk frenzy abounds, put to best use on \u201cSpread Eagle\u201d and its grabby chorus, a hotdog-fingered pillaging of Carly Simon\u2019s \u201cYou Belong to Me.\u201d Order from Aeronaut Records<\/a><\/p>\n
\nDark techno\/grunge-metal hybrid wired for big-budget soundtrack, its signal-to-noise ratio seriously reduced during the first five-odd minutes owing to a cinemophilic overdose of sampled movie dialog. By the time the music comes in it\u2019s more side dish than entr\u00e9e, but worth the wait \u2013 Ivan Munoz and his crew toss the KMFDM playbook aside and content themselves with melody, thus sacrificing bee\u2019s-nest anarchy for well-earned style points. The churning Linkin Park-ish nu-metal of \u201cSurvive\u201d creates a sense of menace lorded over by piranha axemanship and Munoz\u2019s cigar-chomping drill-sergeant bark, lightening up a little for a near-emo chorus that plays like Hoobastank gone techno. And so it goes; \u201cLack of Faith\u201d finds Munoz test-driving an Alice n Chains \u201cRooster\u201d voice in blatant violation of current EBM by-laws.<\/p>\n
\nCaptivating nu-mod techno that shines brightest when this anti-Chemical Brothers duo\u2019s Buggle-oid genes are freed to wreak havoc, in the squeaky bimborama floor-filler \u201cWelcome to My World\u201d for example, punctuated as it is with Mike Johnson\u2019s space-ghoul mumbling. \u201cGrief Cry\u201d does a fake-out of kraut-techno before springing some 60s sexiness which will hopefully inspire a wave of Batgirl dress-up among the fetishists. \u201cI Am\u201d and its Exorcist-riddum tweaks hip-hop\u2019s nose (always a constructive idea), and later mounts a torch-lit Tomb Raider offensive that alludes to far deeper thought processes than what you get from typical genre-clinging convenience. Not to leave himself outdone by the Bollywood gobbledygook of \u201cDark Room,\u201d Johnson tosses in an Alzheimer-addled rehash of BOC\u2019s \u201cDon\u2019t Fear the Reaper\u201d that amounts to Loreena McKennitt getting a wedgie from a robot-zombie mourning a recent diagnosis of kidneystones. Staticky breakbeats pop up sporadically in whack-a-mole fashion, another value-add worthy of forehead stickers all around. Order from Alfa Matrix<\/a>\n<\/p>\n
\nLike labelmates Quell, Taken\u2019s vocals are the drunken jockstrap bellows into the toilet you heard coming out of yourself about an hour after your first 12-pack, and there\u2019s more than a little Fugazi cacophony going on, but Chad Tafolla\u2019s stalker-like reverence for U2\u2019s Edge puts this isolationist-core ahead of the colicky pack. Aside from some grindcore windmill-chasing, this EP\u2019s songs (all 5 of which seem a million years long each) are the conjectural results of Slayer rumbling with the Alarm, and they\u2019re often \u2013 dare it be said \u2013 gorgeous. Order from Goodfellow Records<\/a><\/p>\n
\nMan oh man, is this chick asking for it \u2013 she looks like an SUV-driving mom dressed in a Wonder Woman costume, tiara and all, with a CD insert that\u2019s almost a comic book but not quite, more like a knockoff of Powerpuff Girls with a few ossified grrl-power platitudes. Fingers poise over keyboards all over reviewer-land, ready to ream her a new one, but the tunes kick in and damn it all, the pummellings are denied as the fingers unclench, howling in frustration like ringwraiths denied a bite out of Frodo: the Cookie Cutter Girl actually isn\u2019t bad. A vocal cross between Shania Twain and Natalie Merchant, the songwriting here is pro-level and almost as tight as her spandex nut-outfit. Order direct from Lynn Julian<\/a><\/p>\n
\nLike a relentless ear-humping from a Viagra-crazed chihuahua, this Warhol-vortex jrock floats like a Hendrix and stings like a New York Doll. It\u2019s as if Jackie Chan had been born for guitar rather than karate \u2013 picture him screaming \u201cI\u2019m a rawwwk star, baby!\u201d over something blatantly akin to Jimi\u2019s \u201cFire\u201d played at 78 RPM and your imagination needs no further stretching. Fine Stooges-style stuff, of course (as is just about anything Japanese and indie lately) featuring more wolf-howls than David Lee Roth would normally recommend for trying at home.
\n Order from GEMM <\/a><\/p>\n
\nSensitive-male torch zydeco understatements slow dripped Cat Stevens style in honor of your local laptop-pecking coffee-bar fixture. When Armfield stows his chimp-at-the-wheel trilling safely out of earshot his moonlight serenades hit nothing but net (if your idea of mood music is the sort of post-breakup montage backdrop common to Meg Ryan films, that is), although your bohemian-wannabe Paris-trotting aunt will surely be more profoundly affected than anyone else in your immediate circle. Order from Overstock.com<\/a><\/p>\n
\nCleveland-spawned multi-genre prototype that succeeds in the face of a situation comparable to inviting your strangest bedfellows to the same party. Mainstream listeners will block out the occasional crackly sample-breaks and hear hard rock or nu-psychedelica depending on the song, but it\u2019s more a stew of both those styles further synth-refined into a concoction deserving of its own slick classification \u2013 aggro-indie perhaps (aggro, for all the blessedly unaware non-scenesters, is wonk-English for techno-metal). A slightly vulnerable production prevents this from being as drunkenly powerful as, say, KMFDM, but makes it CMJ-relevant in the same stroke. Title track combines ennui-drone vocals with buzzsaw guitar and caustic industrial patterns that peak during its zillion-layer chorus. Fair comparison here would be Flesh Field, but then there\u2019s the Garbage vs Melvins scuffle in \u201cOverload\u201d with its ear-drilling fuzz-bombs. There\u2019s talk of big-league interest already, which comes as no surprise. Order from the band’s website<\/a>\n<\/p>\n
\nUnplugged guitar-and-string post-punk nonsense resembling an uninspired Clash trying to impress the one hot waitress at an Irish-American groggery. \u201cWallet\u201d coughs up some not-unpalatable ska that quickly gets hamstrung by the same weasel-faced fiddle that cocks up everything else, not that it isn\u2019t already seasick from the massive overdose of Lennon\/McCartney reverb. And the choruses are all identical. And they\u2019re momma\u2019s so fat she\u2019d take up all the space at the club anyway. Order from Rodent Records<\/a>\n<\/p>\n