Guitars, Drums, Tones, and Saxophones

Sharks Come Cruisin' - A Past We Forget That We Need to Know

Hailing from Providence, RI, Sharks Come Cruisin’– not to be confused, as I did initially, with the Sharks– play music that could be best be described as hopped up sea shanties. There’s a Celtic flair to some of the songs, and when they kick it up with electric instrumentation- as on “Strike the Bell”- it might even cross into Celtic-punk, but unlike so many of the bands that have been tagged in that genre, especially in the commercial wake of the Dropkick Murphys just north of these fellas, it’s not forced, or worse, cheesy.

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Frontrunner - A Billion Arnies

The first few times I listened to this debut EP from Boston-based hardcore band Frontrunner, I read the title as A Billion Armies, completely missing the obvious reference to an Arnold Palmer can, and the billion or so emptied Arnies littering the picture behind the text. I’m nothing if not observant.

Luckily, for me anyway, the band’s music hits hard enough that even the most obtuse listened- yours truly, in this case- can’t miss the meaning or the intensity.

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Bomb the Music Industry! - Vacation

Bomb the Music Industry! seem to be a pretty divisive band. On one hand, you have a substantial, vocal group of proponents who love everything the band does without fail. And then there are their equally vocal detractors, who see their music as ADD-addled goofball nonsense. Indeed, the hyperkinetic ska-influenced rock of BtMI! can be off-putting. I myself was somewhere in the middle; I liked some of their songs (“Ready… Set… No!!!” is a personal favorite) but never got the extreme love, or the extreme hate.

Vacation, though, is a completely different animal from their previous efforts. Sure, the musical progression from Scrambles, the band’s 2010 album, is clear, but it’s still a big leap, and may in fact bring around some of the haters. I had no intention of even checking this out until some friends whose taste I trust recommended it.

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Landmines - Commerce and Marx

Landmines are a melodic hardcore band out of Richmond, VA, which seems to be a ridiculously fertile ground for musicians of the punk rock-associated type. Commerce and Marx is their second full-length, and second for Paper + Plastick, who should need no introduction, what with their very strong roster of bands. I was fortunate enough to catch Landmines on their recent tour promoting this record, so I got to experience some of the tracks live before listening to the record.

The band’s overall sound hasn’t changed too dramatically from their self-titled debut and the interim Hell is What You Make It EP; if you enjoyed their Strike Anywhere-influenced brand of melodic hardcore before, you’ll like what you hear here. If anything, they’ve refined their attack and upped the melodies. For those who missed out on those earlier releases- and really, you should go give them a listen; “Excess and Indifference” from the self-titled, if nothing else- the band offers up thirteen fast, catchy jams with plenty of energy and sing-along choruses.

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Asian Man Records 15th Anniversary

Over the past week, I was fortunate enough to be able to attend Asian Man Records’ 15th Anniversary Festival in San Francisco. For those unfamiliar, Asian Man Records is a label started by Mike Park of Skankin’ Pickle, The Bruce Lee Band, and The Chinkees. Over the years, Asian Man has released many, many records from bands like Slapstick, Lemuria, The Broadways, as well as helping to launch the careers of bands like Less Than Jake, Alkaline Trio, and The Lawrence Arms. Personally, the first time I found the folded-up mail order one-sheet catalog for Asian Man in a CD- it was Less Than Jake’s Pezcore- was a huge moment in my entrance into punk rock.

The festival was 5 days of shows in San Francisco, with high profile reunions of short-lived but classic Asian Man bands, Slapstick and The Broadways, not to mention bands like Slow Gherkin and MU330. The shows I attended were:

• Slapstick, MU330, The Chinkees
• Alkaline Trio, The Hot Toddies, Kepi Ghoulie, The Atom Age
• The Broadways, Bomb the Music Industry!, Ratasucia, Spraynard
• The Lawrence Arms, Toys That Kill, Short Round, Spraynard, Chotto Ghetto

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Frank Turner - England Keep My Bones

Frank Turner is back with his second album since signing to Epitaph here in the States, and fourth overall. Since he released Poetry of the Deed in 2009, he’s released a collaborative 10″ with Jon Snodgrass and the Rock & Roll EP, as well as closing out The Fest 9 with a masterful solo set that spilled into the parking lot across the street from the venue.

England Keep My Bones finds Frank with more full band arrangements than on previous records, but also he sounds more comfortable in that setting than similarly-arranged songs did on Poetry of the Deed. It helps that, by and large, the songs here are stronger than on his previous full-length, which I admit I didn’t find nearly as compelling as the excellent Love, Ire & Song.

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Football, Etc. - The Draft

I’m not sure when exactly I became aware of Football, etc., an excellent emo/indie band out of Houston, Texas. I think it was when I got to see them play a show here in Boston with P.S. Eliot. At any rate, I was captivated by their sound, calling to mind that of the classic mid-’90s emo bands like Braid, Christie Front Drive, and Sunny Day Real Estate, among others. I had enjoyed their free First Down EP (get it here from If You Make It), and anxiously awaited a full-length. And now, at long last, it is here!

And if you want to read the rest of my review of this record, you can see it over in AMP MAGAZINE! Yes, that’s right, my thoughts have been printed in an honest-to-goodness magazine. How about that?

Anyway, go read more about this great record here!

Balance & Composure - Separation

Balance & Composure, hailing from Doylestown, PA, have finally released their full-length! After dropping a pair of EPs- I Just Want to Be Pure and Only Boundaries- and their well-received split with Tigers Jaw, No Sleep Records delivers this LP from a band that has seemed to improve with great strides over each release.

And Separation is certainly no exception to that.

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Hunx & His Punx - Too Young to Be in Love

I first became aware of Hunx and His Punx at SXSW last year, when I was able to catch their set with Happy Birthday. I was completely blown away by their performance, and immediately picked up a copy of Gay Singles. It made sense when I later learned that Nobunny had helped write a number of the songs from that record. Hunx’s sound has a lot in common with Nobunny: the raw, garage rock sound, and a love for the Ramones (pretty explicitly stated in “You Don’t Like Rock ‘n Roll”), though Hunx infuses his music with more than a little bit of a ’50s/’60s girl group sound. And it’s that latter influence that comes to the fore on the new record, Too Young to Be in Love.

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Screeching Weasel - First World Manifesto

It’s nice to see that Ben Weasel is keeping busy. After the one-two punch of the recent pair of Riverdales releases- Invasion USA in 2009 and last year’s Tarantula- he and a new lineup of the classic Chicago Ramones devotees Screeching Weasel have returned to Fat Wreck and issued First World Manifesto, the first Screeching Weasel album in 2000′s Teen Punks in Heat.

So how has ten years changed Screeching Weasel?

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