If It's Too Loud...

Halloween is by far my favorite holiday. There are no family obligations, you can celebrate pretty much anyway you want (including staying inside and watching movies), it's the one time of the year my fascination with the macabre isn't considered weird, and candy, candy, candy. To celebrate, here is an alternative mix of season appropriate songs. I avoided the completely obvious ones you'll hear at least 10 times today no matter what ("Monster Mash," "Werewolf of London," "Thriller"). Instead, I went with some classic hip hop (Geto Boys, DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince), punk (Ramones, The Dead Milkmen), 80s and 90s favorites (Dinosaur Jr, Letters to Cleo), current favorites (Benjamin Booker, Sallie Ford), and, of course, a smidge of metal. It's longer than our normal mixes, but 31 is 13 backwards, and 2 hours is about as long as trick or treating lasts. Plus, I love Halloween. Enjoy!

I really don't know what to make of this week: Lagwagon - Hang : Our 90s-tastic release week begins with a new album from Lagwagon, their first in nearly a decade. My teen years had a ska phase, but I could never really embrace the punk side, and Lagwagon is firmly there. If you've been missing out, there might be a lot here for you to love, but for me, this wasn't quite it. The Twilight Sad - Nobody Wants to Be Here and Nobody Wants to Leave : An album I queued up because I thought they were a different band (probably the Twilight Singers), this was actually a pretty high quality dour indie rock record. The vocals are really distinctive and the songs memorable as they sort of lodged themselves into my brain. I will definitely seek out more of their stuff, but for now, this new album deserves a listen in a somewhat thin week. Lily & Madeleine - Fumes : Lily & Madeleine are fairly prolific, with their third album they definitely expand their sound a little ...

My obsession with Benjamin Booker has been pretty well documented on this site. Having missed him coming through Boston twice in the spring (opening for Hurray for the Riff Raff and Courtney Barnett), but catching him live at the Newport Folk Festival this year, I jumped at the chance to see what I believe was his first headlining show in Boston. Plus, he was playing the 300 capacity TT the Bear's. I can't imagine he'll be playing small clubs like this one for much longer. Live, Benjamin Booker is an absolute revelation. He's what Kurt Cobain could have been if he had followed his bluesy side further. His three piece band tore through his first and only album. His folk side came out when he put down his guitar for "Slow Coming." Accompanied by his drummer on ukulele and his bassist on fiddle, somehow the most mellow song of the night was one of the highlights of an otherwise fiery set. For an encore, he closed with an 8 minute noise jam of "Have You...

A much lighter week in all regards. Nude Beach - 77 : A lot of acts are certainly throwbacks, but Nude Beach is really the best outright nostalgia-sounding act I've heard in some time. It feels like an indie/alt-rock album from 20 years ago and it's a great, albeit a little long, listen. Absolutely the release of the week, a solid listen. Jukebox the Ghost - Jukebox the Ghost : I've always been a fan of Jukebox the Ghost even though I never actively seek them out, and the new album should really be a reminder to me that I should change that. It's a tight, well-paced album with a lot of good songs (including one of the better leadoff tracks I've heard lately), and I feel like the band simply doesn't get enough credit on a whole. Definitely worth a listen for this week. Cold War Kids - Hold My Home : I, like most others, got turned onto Cold War Kids through the great "Hang Me Out to Dry." They haven't been successful at replicating that f...

We love covers here at If It's Too Loud..., and we love Dom Flemons. Typically, he goes way in the past of American music for covers, but he recently released a video of his band and himself covering Wyclef Jean's "Bubblegoose." Wyclef is somehow both the most overrated and underrated artist of the last 20 years, and this is a great take on his song. Dom Flemons' version strays away from the R&B of the original and gives it more of a hip-hop/folk twist that would have made the original a much better song. In the middle they cram the chorus of Outkast's "Ms. Jackson." Not really sure why since it seems forced and distracts from the rest of the song, but it's there. For more info about Dom Flemons, including ordering his fantastic album from earlier this year, Prospect Hill , head on over to his website . He also has some dates coming up with Wesley Stace's Cabinet of Wonders and Old Crow Medicine Show . You can also follow Wyclef on ...

As much as I loved Wild Flag's first and only album, when I heard they were breaking up, there was a hint of hope that it meant Sleater-Kinney might reunite. Then, all three members joined Pearl Jam on stage to cover "Rockin' In the Free World." On Friday, reports surfaced of a mystery 7" to be included with their new Start Together box set. Yesterday, it was confirmed that Sleater-Kinney is indeed reuniting, and they have a new album coming out that was secretly recorded. No Cities to Love  is due out on 1/20/15 on Sub Pop, and yes, there is a tour. You can get a download of "Bury Our Friends" for the cost of an email address at Sleater-Kinney's website . You can also check out their tour dates, which I couldn't be more excited for. For some reason, they were that band I never got out to see for no real reason, and I'll thankfully get another shot.

Lady Lamb the Beekeeper is currently recording her second, the follow up to my #1 album of 2013 , and to satiate our need for the new album, she just posted a cover of Kurt Vile's "Girl Called Alex." I'm personally not all that into Kurt Vile, but this cover makes me want to give him another listen. It's a beautifully trippy version that makes me want her second album all that more. It's a bedroom recording, which hearkens back to her very first recordings. Besides the Kurt Vile cover, you'll want to check out her entire SoundCloud page , which also includes covers of Emmylou Harris and Cher. Oh, and "Girl Called Alice" is available as a free download.

The Dead Milkmen have released a new video for their song "The Sun Turns Our Patio Into a Lifeless Hell." The song is inspired by an infomercial Rodney Anonymous saw depicting how awful your life can be without a patio awning. The video was inspired by old silent German expressionist films and features all the creepy baby doll heads you could possibly want. It's all the perfect blend of humor, trippy abstraction, punk, and humor that categorizes the best of The Dead Milkmen.  You can watch the video below. If you happen to be in either Baltimore, MD or Lancaster, PA, you can see them next weekend at Metro Gallery or Chameleon Club respectively. And in case you haven't, go to their website  for more info and order their album on Amazon (the cd format is currently on sale for $9.00!).

Things are slower than last week, but that doesn't say too much. A lot of interesting releases this week: Sallie Ford - Slap Back : Blog favorite Sallie Ford puts out her first solo album this week, and it's actually a lot more straightforward than I personally expected. The blues/soul stuff that we've gotten used to with her Sound Outside albums is muted somewhat in this album and replaced with a more straightforward rock attitude that has a lot of interesting wrinkles to it. On first listen, I like it but I expected something different. A lot of this, much like her last album, might be a grower, and I'm more than happy to give it an opportunity. Winterpills - Echolalia : I knew I wanted to listen to this one when I saw it on the new release schedule, but I couldn't quite figure out why I remembered this band until I realized that their previous album was on constant rotation for me for quite a while. Echolalia is a covers album, and it wouldn't be im...

I've become very enamored with podcasts over the last couple years (I know I'm about 10 years behind the trend), and over the last few months I've been exposed to two great music podcasts that are both different than anything I've heard and have become fixtures in my podcast rotation. Pitch is a podcast about music stories, sort of like the 99% Invisible (not a music podcast, but one you need to be listening to) of music. Only 9 episodes in, the stories range from karaoke experiences to learning how to play piano for a major Broadway production to whether a drummer missing a hand really found love. At typically under 15 minutes a pop, they're the perfect quick hits for the short drives, and I can truly say that none of the episodes have failed me yet. Song Exploder is another short podcast with about 20 episodes under its belt. This podcast, instead of telling stories with music in the framework, actively deconstructs songs with the musicians who wrote and/...

When I heard Tee Jay, the drummer for Walter Sickert & The Army of Broken Toys , had a side project described as "...  early 90's melodic hardcore... blended with some shoegaze..." I knew I had to check Martyrs out. This is about as far from the folk/gypsy/punk/burlesque that defines the Army of Toys, and I'm thrilled to hear something so different come from a member of that band. The description the band uses is perfect, and it definitely has more of a At The Drive-In feel to it than Jawbreaker. Picture Dischord Records signing a shoegaze band. It's heavy and beautiful and just about perfect. The fact that it was recorded last month and is already out for free download is what I love about the current music scene. I can't find any website or social media outlet for Martyrs, but they do have a Soundcloud where you can stream or download their debut for free.

Tom Morello at the 2012 Newport Folk Festival First up is a new song from Tom Morello 's Nightwatchman persona, which has seen him dabble more in the acoustic folk song realm of music. "Marching On Ferguson" is, of course, a protest song inspired by the death of Michael Brown and the protests that followed it. It's available free at Ferguson October , but donations are being accepted to assist protesters in paying legal bills associated with any arrests during the protests. Politics aside, the song is good, but not great. It's the closest The Nightwatchman has gotten to Rage Against the Machine yet. It's basically a blues song with Morello's signature riffs and solos from his time with Rage. If you've read this far, you probably need to check it out. Run the Jewels (aka Killer Mike and El-P) have a second free album coming out soon, and they just released a new song for it. If you're releasing a free album, why not include Zach De La Rocha ...

I love a good duet. It's no surprise that two of my favorite songs of all time (The Dears's "27: The Death of All Romance" and Hayes Carll & Cary Ann Hearst's "Someone Like You") are duets, so I figured this would be a good week to highlight some duets given the surprise of Best Coast's Bethany Cosentino singing on the new Weezer song "Go Away." With the exception of The Dears, I tried to keep the songs to surprising collaborations (like Pete Yorn and Scarlett Johannsen or Jack White and Alicia Keyes) or interesting combinations (Mark Knopfler and Emmylou Harris, Taylor Swift and Gary Lightbody). I also expect this to be the last time Taylor Swift makes one of these mixes. With that said, enjoy!

We're now two albums into the resurgence of The Dead Milkmen, and the band still hasn't slowed down. Most punk bands from the 80s and 90s started watering down their sound, becoming more and more mellow and generic. Happily, The Dead Milkmen still sound like The Dead Milkmen. It's almost like they didn't go away, they were just paused for a decade or so before coming back. Somehow they still seem just as angry as ever. It could be because so many of the same issues they sang about 25 years ago are still relevant. A song like "Right Wing Pigeons" from 1985's Big Lizard in My Backyard  still has some of the same themes as "Welcome to Undertown," 29 years later. They even still get to take shots at Ronald Reagan in "Ronald Reagan Killed the Black Dahlia." It's not all politics that The Dead Milkmen rage against on their new album. "Pretty Music For Pretty People" criticizes today's pop (and rock) stars who don't...

A ridiculous amount of music came out this week, so let's not waste any time. Flying Lotus - You're Dead! : This is my first exposure to Flying Lotus and his brand of electronic jazz/hip-hop. It's not an album I feel like I can give a fair shake to, as it's way outside my areas of knowledge and typical listening, but I will say that I was grooving at a number of points during my initial listen. It's worth tossing in your rotation just to see what the fuss is about. O'Death - Out of Hands We Go : O'Death's third full length album continues to send them along the trajectory of this gothic-style alt-country that they do so well. Filled with a number of memorable songs and providing a bit of a unique atmosphere, this is an album that sounds unlike anything I've heard as of late, and really fits in well with a lot of what we tend to highlight here. Definitely worth a listen. Vashti Bunyan - Heartleap : I remember when Vashti Bunyan's second ...