Music reviews. CD reviews. Critically hip!

This album is one that hurts. The self-titled debut from A 750ml Affair is 49 minutes of loneliness, heartbreak, and heartache, with very little good stuff to even it all out. It’s difficult to imagine – or to put in words – the sadness expressed throughout the 12 tracks on ...

I made the mistake of listening to Circles by A Chinese Firedrill, immediately after I finished reviewing another disc that I found occasionally interesting, but more often ordinary. Oddly, though I physically got up and changed the CD in the player, I more or less forgot that fact that first ...

Pop-rockers A Cursive Memory have been around and under the radar for the past couple of years, but they’re finally attempting to breakout with their full-length debut Changes. A laid-back Southern Cali feel permeates the entire album, which is no surprise given the bands South Bay origins. Changes is pleasant ...

A Fine Frenzy is the musical offering of 21-year-old Alison Sudol, a wan softly melancholy redhead with a wide smile and a look tailor-made for an autumn catalogue. Her debut album, One Cell in the Sea, is 14 songs of alternative pop and indie soul which lifts and rocks the ...

A Little Space is essentially two guys, Alan Gruskoff, aka "Big Al," who with a few exceptions writes and performs literally everything on A LITTLE SPACE; and Terrell Moran, who provides vocals on nine of the fourteen tracks on this release. And therein lies the split personality of this disc. ...

A title like A Looney Tunes Sing-Along Christmas is about as far from deceptive packaging as you can get. It’s out front: you should not be expecting a hidden track featuring a selection from the so-far unreleased CHINESE DEMOCRACY by Guns n’ Roses. Nope, what it says is what you get, which ...

Two plus two be…fore you knew it A-plus came out with his first solo album. My Last Good Deed was born out of struggle, a birth from conflict, like finally mastering high school algebra after several nights of studying, dulled-down erasers, and poor grades on final exams. A-Plus finally makes ...

The Lost Art of Conversation, Vol. 1 is the debut EP by A Third Wish Granted, a California trio that has received some fair amount of attention recently. This disc consists of six tracks which are somewhat uneven in execution but show promise for the band as ...

The film A Walk To Remember took a lot of slack for being a middle of the road love story. It should come as no surprise then that A Walk To Remember’s soundtrack serves as an equally lukewarm companion piece.  When all goes according to plan, a movie and it’s ...

Women are a mystery to most men. I've been kicking around now for a half-century and I understand a little more than a did ten years ago. One of the things I understand is that sometimes it's better just to say to hell with it and not bother.I accordingly have ...

A>S>H>S, an acronym for Audible Stellar Hypnotic Solutions, is the brainchild of Houston percussionist Jason Williams. The music is a fusion of jazz, electronica, fusion, and funk; the ensemble at it’s core is a sextet which includes Williams, Joseph Berryman on tenor sax, Xavier Gonzalez on congas, bassist Scott Nichols, ...

If you love partaking in jam sessions and have a thing for bands who take a chance and ooze creativity, then gAame, the latest release from Aa (BiG A little a) will definitely become your new favorite CD.While there is a definite lack of lyrical expression, Brooklyn’s Aa, who define ...

This album was a hard one to get through.  The attempts to listen while driving my car were met with failure.  Any other attempts when I couldn’t actively focus were also met with failure.  It wasn’t until I was in the comfort of my own house with a nice pair ...

Abigail Hopkins follows up her acclaimed debut album Smile Road, with her sophomore album Blue Satin Alley. Smile Road was a much more cheerful-sounding album, but Blue Satin Alley still contains Hopkins’s mesmerizing gritty sound, reminiscent of PJ Harvey, an artist who she lists as an influence and one who ...

In their sophomore release, Ace Troubleshooter has come up with a decent, if formulaic, album. The opening track, "The Madness Of The Crowd," has a huge punk rock hook, full of fuzz guitar and bass and a speedy tempo, along with the required angst ridden lyrics that include, "Here I ...

Adam Fears’ new album is one that I liked in the first six seconds. This album has it all, from the up-tempo songs (You Get Me and Rock It On) to songs about love (Old Mistake and Right Now). Each song tells a story and the music give you the ...

Ever since The Fray, I love bands that add a solid piano in their melodies. It has forged itself into the alternative genre, as demonstrated by the Adam Gilbert band. He has a show tune quality to his voice, like he’s been in productions before. His back-up singers have the ...

So, why exactly was Candyman 3 made? Did some studio exec realize that there weren't enough minority slasher pics being made, and greenlight this second sequel to poor Danny Robitaille's story? I'm not sure. What I do know, from listening to Adam Gorgoni's score to the film, is that ...

Even though you may not recognize his name you may very well be familiar with the music of Adam Green. Green, a co-founder of the Moldy Peaches, most recently of Juno fame, is also an accomplished and profound solo artist.His new album, Sixes & Sevens, runs the gamut of popular ...

At the turn of the century, Adema was a hot property, with family connections (original lead singer Mark Chavez is related to “Korn” mastermind Jonathan Davis), and local hype resulting in multiple labels bidding for their services. The band parlayed that, and their then hot nu-metal sound into a successful ...

Craving an honest expression that transcends the superficiality we hear on the radio everyday? Well your in luck because Portland based Adrian Orange and Her Band are about to release a self titled album that will end your search. Orange's voice is not what most vocal coaches would consider beautiful. ...

In the late 1960s a group named Iron Butterfly released an album titled IN-A-GADDA-DA-VIDA. On the vinyl version the title track was something like 16 minutes long and took up one side of the disc. It featured a extended (very extended) instrumental break which included a drum solo that seemed ...

Title sums it up nicely — “American Steel,” or this discontented, pure bred, fast and easy Rock n’ Roll animal roaming wherever the fuck it wants.  Driven by three chords, a taste for blood, and kick in the balls, their sixth record probably sounds much like their first—face it, there’s ...

The last thing the members of Boxcar Racer would probably want to be compared to is Blink 182. However, since all music for “Boxcar Racer” was written by Thomas Delonge and Travis Barker, the similarities to Blink could not be ignored.Often referred to by the media as a ‘side project,’ ...

How about a few dead leaves to go with those April showers? Indeed, one of the Bay Area's finest Punk bands arrives about six months out of season for their "sorrowful" new release, which in spite of its dark wanderings, is as much a breeding ground for rejoice and renewal. ...