I mentioned a while back that Showroom of Compassion was one of my most anticipated DIY albums of 2011, and here we are, two days after its release and judgement day is here.
Cake hasn’t released an album of all new material since 2004’s stellar Pressure Chief, so naturally I’ve been quite eagerly waiting for this release. And the first thing I have to say is that this album introduces us to a completely different side of Cake (as expected after such a long gap). Here we see a much more chilled-out sounding band with slightly more polished, less jammy songs. Singer Jon McCrae has even minimized his “Hey”s and “Awwwwwwh”s on this album, which were at one point one of Cake’s most stereotypical trademarks.
The first two tracks, “Federal Funding” and “Long Time” feel a lot like every other Cake album you have in your iTunes despite their age and low-ish listen count (not that there’s anything at all wrong with those albums, they just seem to be guilty pleasure albums for most people I have talked to). Its not until the third track, “Got to Move” that we start to hear the slowed-down (ironic, right?) more “mature” sounding Cake. This song feels very polished and even has some big soaring harmonies towards the end, which I’m really enjoying.
While there are a few more standard style Cake rock songs on the album, “Sick Of You” and “Easy to Crash”, the chill style holds up through nearly all of it. And I’m suprisingly pleased with the results. It makes for a nice change of pace and a great driving album. You can pick up Showroom of Compassion at most major music retailers now, and if you’re located in the Cincinnati area like we are you can see Cake, May 19th at the Aronoff Center.
Despite its age, this clip is still a fantastic representation of one of my current favorite indie duos: Matt & Kim. Here the dance-punk duo perform an “acoustic” version of live favorite “Yea Yeah” on Roosevelt Island in NYC. I love that Kim is drumming on a cardboard box, a tupperware container and some sort of dish here. Sorry about the poor audio quality, but its the only version of this performance I’ve found. If you can find a better one let me know.
It’s exam time in my world so the writings been slowing down, and unfortunately so has the listening. However, I now have listened to the new Decemberists album The King Is Dead to share my thoughts, which are as follows:
Considering how big of a departure in writing style this is for Colin Meloy I think he handled the album well. All of the songs are very strong and have very distinct and catchy melodies. I must admit that I was a bit nervous about this when I heard that the new album would have no concept. The group’s last full-length, The Hazards of Love, was so extremely concept driven that I felt like Meloy would have a lot of difficulty writing good stand-alone tracks. Thankfully he proved me wrong.
Though much folkier than my usual taste I am in love with the album’s opening track “Don’t Carry It All”. It has nice feel-good lyrics, a big arrangement, nice harmonica solos, good male/female harmonies, and the typical large vocabulary we all love in a Decemberists song. The rest of the album doesn’t fail to capture the listener’s attention either. There are some songs that are somewhat weaker, such as “January Hymn” and the overly-country influenced “All Arise!”, their are plenty more hits than misses. I’m suspecting that the aforementioned “Don’t Carry It All” as well as “Down by the Water” and possibly “Rox in the Box” will perform quite well as singles and live tracks in 2011.
In general I’d say this album is definitely worth your time if you’re at all into folk-rock or rock-country hybrids. And be sure to watch out for The Decemberists as they will probably be on the road soon to support the new album.
While this has been circulated around the web quite a bit, I still feel the need to post it and applaud the ingenuity of this group. This pop trio shot an A Capella mix of hit songs from 2010, exclusively on their iPhones, then edited it all together to play on two iPads simultaneously. While I hate a large majority of the tracks featured in the video the idea is still very very cool. Enjoy the sights and sounds above, and download the track here.
Here at DIY Music, our goal is to tell the world about what we think is good music, but also to let you tell the world what YOU think is good music. Therefore, we have included a link at the top right of our actual tumblog page (diymusic.tumblr.com) where you can “Submit” a post to us which we will then review and post (giving you credit of course). So help us help you and submit some new music for everyone to check out.
Let me begin by saying that it has been far too long since we heard from ADTDF. I saw these guys two years ago at a local club, The Mad Hatter, where they played as a supporting band for Hazle Weatherfield, but really stole the show. A friend and I bought their EP The Process and fell in love with the group’s sound. To this day it is one of the most played albums in my iTunes. And now we finally have some new music from the Cincy native post-punk alt-rock outfit.
Best Laid Plans opens with a powerful scream-along called “24 Years” that shows the potential to be a fantastic live track. The momentum doesn’t let up for the first eight rocking tracks, but rather placing the two power ballads at the end of the album. While this seems like an interesting order compared to conventional albums I think it works fairly well, giving you a nice playlist of rockin alt songs before finishing out the experience with a love ballad (“What To Say”) and a bittersweet lament (“Next Year”). The former, “What To Say”, is a bit weaker than the other tracks due to its sparse arrangement but the emotion is felt throughout. “Next Year” however, has been one of my favorite new ADTDF tracks since they debuted it on their myspace in the early stages of this album’s creation.
At its best this album is a feel-good alt-rock album with some nice hooks, melodic vocals, and dense arrangements. At its worst it is slightly repetitive post-punk, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing when its Friday night and you just need something to play in the car. Overall, the album is everything I’ve been expecting and certainly worth the free streaming listen.
This track, “Won’t Go Anywhere”, is the first track from a band I’m good friends with called All Real Monsters. The guys have a nice alt-pop-esque sound and some great grooves in here. The mixing is halfway decent for a self-made demo as well. Let me know what you think?
RJD2 recently unveiled two tracks from his new instrumental project called The Insane Warrior. The tracks are heavily funk, hip-hop, dance, and jazz influenced. The Insane Warrior’s first album, We Are The Doorways is due out in February (preorder here), but here are two tracks to wet your appetite.
If you’ll recall, I blogged a few days ago about looking forward to the new Decemberists album, scheduled to come out on the 18th of this month. And here, my prayers have been answered. The Decemberists have posted their full album for free streaming on NPR’s website, which I’ve posted a link to below for you all below. This is so recent I haven’t even had the time to review it yet, but I’ll post that seperately later on. For now, enjoy. And make sure you also follow the fantastic music blog Some Kind of Awesome, who turned me on to this.
This is a blog started by a group of friends with a passion for the Do-It-Yourself trends in underground music over the years. In the spirit of DIY this blog accepts suggestions and posts from anyone who wishes to contribute.
If you’ll recall, I blogged a few days ago about looking forward to the new Decemberists album, scheduled to come out on the 18th of this month. And here, my prayers have been answered. The Decemberists have posted their full album for free streaming on NPR’s website, which I’ve posted a link to below for you all below. This is so recent I haven’t even had the time to review it yet, but I’ll post that seperately later on. For now, enjoy. And make sure you also follow the fantastic music blog 
