Last year was particularly stellar for some of the life-affirming bands who helped write the vibrant 1990s indie-rock movement into the history books. Built to Spill, Superchunk, and Guided by Voices dropped new albums that stack up to their classics, while Pavement embarked on another successful reunion tour. But Archers of Loaf might have one-upped […]
Author Archives: Brad Cohan
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Seb Alvarez of Meth leaves his comfort zone in noise-centric collective Virgin Mother
Chicago group Meth are known for their big and burly scorched-earth mash-up of mathcore, noise rock, and ambient music, which they execute with surgical precision. At the center of their dissonant sprawl is vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Seb Alvarez, who started Meth as a solo project before developing the current six-piece iteration. The band put out […]
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As Earthen Sea, Jacob Long makes dub-damaged bangers for dystopian dance floors
Jacob Long has been knee-deep in the DIY punk underground over the past two decades, spending time in a couple of beloved bands. In the early aughts, Long doled out a batshit-crazy mess of postpunk and free jazz with his pals in the way-too-short-lived Dischord Records outfit Black Eyes before jetting from D.C. to San […]
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All-star indie quintet the Royal Arctic Institute make twangy space jazz on From Catnap to Coma
The Royal Arctic Institute is a group of New York- and New Jersey-based musicians who made indelible marks on the east coast’s underground rock heyday of the 80s and 90s as members of Das Damen, Two Dollar Guitar, and Cell. This instrumental band operates with a core trio: guitarist John Leon (who’s played with Roky […]
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Bummer’s noise-rock rippers provide a glimpse into their midwestern nightmare
Since 2013, Kansas City trio Bummer have been belting out full-tilt, bludgeoning sludge that’s heightened by their dark-humored taste for grim obsessions and disaffected existence. Over a handful of EPs and one previous full-length, guitarist-vocalist Matt Perrin, bassist Mike Gustafson, and drummer Sam Hutchinson have railed against the ennui of their dead-end daily routines with […]
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Dinosaur Jr. kick out epic melodies, hooks, and noise on their best postreunion album
Dinosaur Jr.’s second act is a feel-good gift that keeps on giving. These unwavering indie-rock lifers seem to have access to a bottomless well of arena-ready solos and riffs, brain-sticking melodies, and hurricane-force noise. In the late 1980s, the powerhouse trio—guitarist and singer J Mascis, bassist and singer Lou Barlow, and drummer Murph—became a revolutionary […]
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The Body kick off 2021 with the their heaviest, noisiest, and bleakest record yet
Categorizing the doomsday sonic bludgeon wielded by Providence duo the Body over their two-decade reign of terror isn’t an easy task. Guitarist and screamer Chip King and drummer Lee Buford slice and dice doom, sludge, noise, and avant-metal into a monolithic, nails-on-chalkboard wall of sound. Buford’s hip-hop-mangled thumping and pounding and King’s six-feet-under caterwaul could […]
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On May You Be Held, Sumac are a beast of free improvisation, noise, and metal
There’s a lot of room in the vast and aesthetically diverse landscape of metal, but one powerhouse trio occupies its own sound-deconstructing universe: Sumac. The heady metal-centric music that guitarist and vocalist Aaron Turner (Isis, Old Man Gloom), bassist Brian Cook (Russian Circles), and drummer Nick Yacyshyn (Baptists) churn out is such a left-field beast […]
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The Fire Still Burns as veteran jazz saxophonist Alan Braufman builds on his comeback
One of the headiest of all avant-garde jazz heads is Alan Braufman. The veteran saxophonist, flutist, and composer has been wielding his polymathic wizardry since the early 1970s, when he helped put New York City’s loft-jazz movement on the map. But most younger listeners didn’t get their first chance to immerse themselves in his towering, […]