Category: ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

Essential New Music: Various Artists’ “Manchester: North Of England”

Subtitled “A Story Of Independent Music, Greater Manchester 1977-1993,” Manchester: North Of England contains 143 tracks spread over seven CDs.

August 31, 2017 / ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

Katie von Schleicher’s voice is masterful: smoky, breathy, spooky, agile. Throughout the facetiously titled Shitty Hits, she explores the edges.

August 29, 2017 / ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

Midwestern heroes Cheap Trick rose alongside punk, sharing similar values without joining the spiky tumult. Rather, the band wed the

August 29, 2017 / ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

Keigo Oyamada’s 2001 wonderwork Point felt like a gateway into a previously undiscovered world of sound: a trippy, drippy, synesthetic

August 27, 2017 / ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

Good things come to those who wait. Chicago-based singer/multi-instrumentalist James Elkington had a decent run leading the Zincs and Horse’s

August 26, 2017 / ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

The musician credits on the album cover of Monster Vision are aliases. It’s fitting for a band based in Shanghai,

August 24, 2017 / ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

Surveying the Summer of Love that birthed Sgt. Pepper, there were certainly albums of equal (or greater) challenge to be

August 24, 2017 / ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

ZZ Ward’s gritty alto is perfect for singing the blues. Her songs are rooted in the sounds of the delta,

August 22, 2017 / ESSENTIAL NEW MUSIC

R.I.P. MAGNET Senior Writer Jonathan Valania