Gallantly Streaming: Soundgarden, The Trews, Bad Religion

Stream Soundgarden's first album in 16 years here courtesy iTunes.

In an increasingly impatient society that's rife with leaks when it comes to high profile albums, that Soundgarden's hotly anticipated return effort King Animal escaped the leak is nothing short of a miracle. Today, patience has been rewarded via an official stream one week ahead of the album's release.

So, the burning question is how does it all sound? Well, that's not for me to say right now; outside of posting that link, I'm making no effort to listen to King Animal until I've got a CD in my hand and headphones on my dome next week. I figure I've waited this long while only hearing two (really good) songs in full, why not put myself through another seven days of anticipation and reap a sweet payoff when I'm hearing most of it for the first time and flipping through liner notes?

King Animal is out November 13 on Universal.

After a couple of albums' worth of half-baked, radio-pandering detours, The Trews stop trying to become Nickelback on their new EP ...thank you and I'm sorry, out today.

These seven songs find The Trews shaking off the pressure of trying to break into an American market that doesn't favour them and taking a beat to remember what got them a devoted Canada-wide fan base. By and large, these tunes find the band having a blast and being somewhat silly, and it's apparent from the opening Stonesy swagger of The Power Of Positive Drinking that they're not taking things so seriously this time out. Any suspicions to the contrary are wiped out by the smirking, offensive Herm-Aphrodite (She Was A Guy). And it's a blast to hear them rattle off a who's who of Canadian rock history on closer ...And We Are The Trews.

By letting loose and ignoring the nagging desire to grow bigger than their britches, ...thank you and I'm sorry is not just The Trews' best collection of songs since Den Of Thieves, it trumps the best seven songs you can collect from their last two albums.

...thank you and I'm sorry is out now on Bumstead. Have a listen:

Finally, here's a taste of Bad Religion's forthcoming sixteenth(!) album, one that aims to be the first big rock release of 2013 with Green Day moving the final installment of their "grand" trilogy up to December.

The long running punk legends clearly haven't softened too much in their old age; the tracklist is peppered with 2-minute runtimes, and the lead single is a pleasant little ditty called Fuck You.

Let's check it out, shall we?



Sounds good to me. True North is out January 22 on Epitaph.