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HOT OFF THE PRESS (#2)
This is the second installment of a weekly first glance at music discovered in the last seven days, whether it be just-released, just-leaked, or some long-lost gem that has remained under the radar. Click here for the first installment, which regarded the new Beck, Fiery Furnaces, and Ponytail.
White Denim – Workout Holiday
Released June 23, 2008 (on their European label, Full Time Hobby).
So forgive a guy for being skeptical. Yeah, yeah, White Denim were lauded in Rolling Stone, and influential music blog Gorilla vs. Bear touts them so regularly it’s almost embarrassing…when this much hype is brewing in the music world about a band who hasn’t even released a full album, the raising of eyebrows is nothing less than natural. After all, there was Vampire Weekend, and we’ve all seen the shitstorm of divisiveness they’ve caused, what with half the world thinking they are the Second Coming (in cardigans, no less), and the other half of the world thinking they're Afrobeat-appropriating snobs who should just lay back on their yachts and shut their mouths. But let’s give White Denim a chance, if only because they’re from Texas, and have honed their chops on the Austin scene.
Workout Holiday is a collection of a bunch of stuff you’ve seen on their EPs, from foot-stomping “Let’s Talk About It” to “Shake Shake Shake” to screeching “Darksided Computer Mouth.” This garage-y business gets down to the brass tacks of dirty rock, with sloppy and simple construction and frequent breakdowns, and it’s not unlikely that your first listen will seem a bit pale for all the praise. But when it comes down to it, this is some very, very good stuff, and once it gets its energetic claws into you, you’ll have a hard time taking it off the iPod. Third track “Sitting” is an especially excellent tune that demonstrates both the muscle and tenderness of the trio, and “Mess Your Hair Up” has slick undercurrents of The Velvet Underground. The album’s second half is somewhat weak in comparison to the first, but the band is still working all that out, and they’re also putting together a true first LP (which, rumor has it, will be exclusively Web-released in North America right here by Transmission Entertainment...stay tuned for details on that). And if it’s even nearly as catchy and rocking as the majority of this fine little mess of noise, that Sunday gig at this year's ACL Festival is going to be one not to miss.
Listen to songs by White Denim here. Buy Workout Holiday here.
Black Kids – Partie Traumatic
To be released July 22, 2008.
Last year’s acclaimed debut EP Wizard of Ahhhs made Black Kids an official up-and-coming party band, and their eighties-influenced, male-and-female vocaled tunes saw them finding their way onto the mixtapes of angsty little pissers from Brooklyn all the way to the Bay Area. So Partie Traumatic, their first full-length release, arrives with great expectations, and though it’s good for what it is, what it is is something that a tad too often borders on the annoying. And that somewhat-annoying "something" = the type of music that’s really fun to listen to while in the throes of over-energized intoxication—you know, when you dance because you're beyond the ability not to dance—and for this purpose, Black Kids are one of the most fun acts around, questionable moniker and all. Undeniably, Partie Traumatic, led by the first single “I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You,” is fantastically danceable, but there’s also a lack of distinction between songs, and the tricks the band uses to craft its successes crop up too often. While this is an album with lovely songs for a club rotation, for any other of the myriad purposes for listening to music—such as passing the time while driving on I-35 during rush hour—chances are that the absolute lack of irony will wear thin quite quickly.
Listen to songs by Black Kids. Pre-order Partie Traumatic here.
By blog contributor Nick Courtright.