Soak
Before We Forgot How to Dream
Irish teen Bridie Monds-Watson took the name Soak to stand for a combination of soul and folk, which she says describes her distinctive musical style. The description may be accurate on a certain level, but it also misleads. There is nothing traditional here from either of those genres, except maybe in the sense of great music with a profound emotional edge. Soak drenches her album in reveries about growing up in an absurd world where things may not always make sense or be right. This realization grounds her songs.
— Steve Horowitz, PopMatters.com
Algiers
Algiers
Algiers work in pretty well-worn territory on this record; anyone with a passing familiarity with post-punk will likely understand where they’re coming from. However, one should not lump the band in with the likes of Editors, She Wants Revenge or other blatant knockoffs hoping to pilfer the cool of the past. Instead, Algiers do something rather clever with this tried-and-true sound: They externalize it, taking the insular, inward trajectory of post-punk and turning it out onto an unexpecting world. You can make the case that Algiers aren’t original, but it’s hard to argue that they aren’t exciting.
— Kevin Korber, PopMatters.com
Daughn Gibson
Carnation
Three albums in, and Daughn Gibson has found his smoothest mix yet, narrating stories of lust and crime with just enough polish to have them stick in your brain, but still holding their inherent darkness. Gibson’s rantings are propelled by a fresh coat of paint on his music. Carnation certainly shows Gibson taking scissors to his signature sound, re-cutting it to a new style, while keeping his natural waywardness.
— Nathan Stevens, PopMatters.com
Goatsnake
Black Age Blues
Greg Anderson must know a thing or two about meditation. As one-half of the pioneering drone-metal outfit Sunn O))), the guitarist certainly has an understanding of how patience and discipline can take us higher. Now Anderson has revived his pre-Sunn O))) group, the stoner doom riff monster that is Goatsnake. While the thundering, lurching boogie of the band’s comeback effort, Black Age Blues, is basically the opposite of a good, long drone, it has undoubtedly benefitted from its leader spending almost two decades reaching for metal nirvana. To properly meditate, one needs to shut out all distractions. While Sunn O))) is more specifically suited for that kind of thing, you could do worse than pressing play on Black Age Blues, and focusing on how Greg Anderson plays guitar.
— Joe Sweeney, PopMatters.com
Also out this week:
Barenaked Ladies, Silverball
The Darkness, The Last of Our Kind
Dawes, All Your Favorite Bands
Florence and the Machine, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful
Girlpool, Before the World Was Big
Indigo Girls, One Lost Day
Jaga Jazzist, Starfire
Jamie xx, In Colour
Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard, Django and Jimmie
![“Tetris” is a video game that’s simple and, in its way, quite beautiful. People around the world know this, as the Russian puzzler requiring the increasingly quick arrangement of differently shaped four-block pieces that fall from the top of the screen has sold millions and millions of copies over a few decades. The new film […]](https://www.coloradodaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/TNH-L-FilmReview-Tetris-WBOX-033123-01.jpg?w=525 "“Tetris” is a video game that’s simple and, in its way, quite beautiful. People around the world know this, as the Russian puzzler requiring the increasingly quick arrangement of differently shaped four-block pieces that fall from the top of the screen has sold millions and millions of copies over a few decades. The new film […]")