If It's Too Loud...

Artist : Twine Album : New Old Horse Quick Thoughts : Twine feels like if Pavement and Drive-by Truckers had a baby that really enjoyed Black Country New Road. This is a compliment, as this is a wild and wonderful ride with one surprise after another throughout the runtime. This is chaotic in all the best ways, and probably my favorite listen of the week. Songs of Note : "Spine," "New Cleaner," "Same Old Problems," "Fruit to Ripe" Artist : Termanology and TEK Album : Teknology Quick Thoughts : TEK, half of 90s rap favorites Smif-N-Wessun, and Lawrence, MA-native underground rapper Termanology collaborate on a great rap record that has the best of both worlds and borrows from all eras. It has an old school feel with a new school flow, and I really enjoyed this one. Definitely the best rap effort of the week. Songs of Note : "Hustler's Soul," "The Connect," "I Got What You Need," "Boom Bap or Die,...

Photo by Nash Blight There has been an upsurge of fantastic bands from Australia the past few years, and our latest discovery is Twine. Described as alt-noise/country, the quartet just released a single that's going to be a must listen. "Sleeping Dogs" is indeed a chilled out noise rock song with a country twang. The song has that folk/country ramblin' vibe, just with a layer of noise bubbling underneath. Plus, I haven't heard violin being used this well in an alt-rock song since the heyday of that dog. And then there are just these little bursts of noise that are brilliant and come in fairly unexpectedly. The entire thing devolves into a Sonic Youth style chaotic ending, which is obviously going to endear Twine to me even more. Wednesday is the band that comes the closest to Twine's sound, but they take the alternative meets country template and expand on it as far as the noise factor goes. Tom Katsaras (vocals/guitar) says of his band's latest single: ...