music reviews

Dr. Dog – Live in Seattle WA

| Mary Mulholland

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Photo by Laura Musselman taken at Easy Street Records in Seattle, WA 3/17/06

Crocodile Cafe
Seattle, WA
March 17, 2007

Let’s spend it all like sailors, babe, and pretend we just got paid…

The brief history of Philadelphia quintet Dr. Dog has been an extraordinarily lucky one. After their home-recorded 2004 album Toothbrush caught the attention of Jim James, he invited them along on tour with My Morning Jacket. Since then, Dr. Dog has toured with The Strokes, The Raconteurs and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and has garnered mainstream praise from the likes of Rolling Stone, SPIN and The New York Times.

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David Kilgour The Far Now [Merge]

| Lily Cutler

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Rating: 6.0

Kudos to Mr. Kilgour for pulling more rabbits out of his hat than you’ve got fingers and toes. The New Zealander has been co-writing rock history since forming The Clean in the early eighties and continues to deliver on clean, ephemeral pop rock. This album sounds like the product of a series of casual jam sessions meshed with Kilgour’s pure whimsy.

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Locksley Don’t Make Me Wait [Feature Records]

| Andrew Boe

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Rating: 3.5

Back in the early sixties, there was a fairly obscure group comprised of four young men who called themselves the Beatles. Although you may not have heard of them before, they were instrumental in single-handedly acting as a nexus between syrupy fifties pop and drugged out acid rock of the late sixties and early seventies. Another group who may have evaded your radar is the Brooklyn by way of Madison, WI band Locksley. They, like the Beatles in their early days, are a foursome, wear the same outfits, have mostly two to three minute uptempo songs and each sing on the record.

Locksley Why Not Me mp3

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Money Mark Brand New By Tomorrow [Brushfire]

| Andrew Boe

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Rating: 3.0

Is this a Pearl Jam outtakes record culled from their recent self-titled album? Switch out the open avocado with a wooden ghetto blaster and the album cover is almost exactly the same. This CD, however, has nothing to do with Eddie Vedder and his hard rock cohorts. This is a fellow who goes by the name Money Mark, not Marky Mark, and his fourth album lies on the opposite end of the spectrum from any brand of aggressive guitar based rock (or hip hop). The newly released Brand New By Tomorrow often comes across as the kind of music that you would hear at low volume in the summertime when attending your bosses fourth of July barbecue.

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Mezzanine Owls Slingshot Echoes

| Lily Cutler

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Rating: 7.0

Cohesive debuts are few and far between. Here is an album in the ruff: the Mezzanine Owls are sure-footed in their fledgling sound, which is all the more grown-up for standing on the shoulders of giants like R.E.M. and The Jesus and Mary Chain. As a Los Angeles based band, the Owls sound native to Southern California about as much as Pink Martini sounds indigenous to Portland. What they do sound like: Silver Jews, My Bloody Valentine, Built to Spill, and Slowdive.

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Explosions in the Sky All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone [Temporary Residence]

| Mary Mulholland

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Rating:  6.0

I wouldn’t have predicted Explosions in the Sky to be such a popular band. They appeared on Conan O’Brian on February 20th, and an upcoming show at New York’s 1,500 capacity Webster Hall sold out a solid month in advance. Other successes have been easier to predict—the Smashing Pumpkins-influenced Silversun Pickups, the Led Zeppelin incarnate of Wolfmother—but the method behind Explosions in the Sky’s appeal remains more challenging. With shimmering, orchestral grandeur, their latest LP All Of A Sudden I Miss Everyone is a provocative album of moody instrumental soundscapes. If you’re a fan of Sigur Ros or Mogwai, you’ll like Explosions in the Sky’s version as well.

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