SOUND BITES

  Having garnered a fair amount of attention in the indie scene during their formative years, Pinegrove's first album for Rough Trade (2020's Marigold ) saw their profile rise significantly based on the confessional and emotive presentation of the songs and a sense of maturity that resulted from some personal struggles (which have been covered in great detail elsewhere and needn't affect opinions on the band's music).  Like with so many others, however, Pinegrove's rise was punched down by the onset of Covid (I'm really tired of tying that into all of my write-ups lately, but it's inescapable); thus, like with so many others, the pandemic's shadow looms large over Pinegrove's fifth album. filtered through the lens of our current state of affairs, it's easy to feel the anxiety, tension and depression that sits at the heart of these songs. Sonically speaking, there's a little more expansiveness and weight to the songs. Take the sprawling opener...

  To say that much has changed in the last twenty years is probably one of the grossest understatements one could possibly make; this is true in basically every sense for all of us, on levels both global and personal. It's most definitely true for Our Lady Peace, who was for all intents and purposes a completely different band in 2000 when they released (potential hot take incoming) their last great record. Between the release of Spiritual Machines and its newly released sequel album, Our Lady Peace have turned over every band member aside from singer Raine Maida and bassist Duncan Coutts. Their music has also had its share of makeovers and detours since, and Spiritual Machines II is their biggest departure by far. Incorporating synths, keyboards and danceable grooves is old hat for rock bands by this point, and Our Lady Peace has dabbled in pop in the past, but Spiritual Machines II finds them burning everything to the ground and attempting to rise from the ashes covered in glit...

  Very few bands/artists from the alternative era have enjoyed the kind of prolific, creatively free reign as Eels. Since making their buzz-bin debut with minor hit single Novocaine for the Soul just over 25 years ago, Eels have cranked out more music than just about any of their '90s peers I can think of; that Extreme Witchcraft is their fourteenth album is even more impressive considering there was a four year hiatus in there as well (not as impressive when considering King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard exist, but still). Perhaps most dubiously impressive is that this long and full career has happened almost overwhelmingly under the radar; like most artists who came about in the post-grunge alt-rock frenzy of the mis-to-late '90s, Eels' best-remembered projects are the earliest. Second album, 1998's Electro-Shock Blues , is widely praised as their emotional and artistic peak, and it's hard to argue that it's as close to a classic album as Eels have produce...

  When you're a self-professed music fanatic with wide-ranging tastes, sometimes it's easy to let one slip through the cracks. So, when I heard Comeback Kid was releasing a new record, my thought process was, "oh yeah, they put out an okay record back in 2005, nice that they're still around", and that was the end of it. Wake the Dead didn't really register too much with me upon release, probably because I was too busy listening to Arcade Fire's Funeral and seeking out likeminded artists in the budding indie invasion. As a result, I just failed to pay attention to what they were doing in the years since. Shame on me. Heavy Steps , the Winnipeg-based crew's seventh album, is relentless; from the drop, its 32 minutes go hard and fast, piling licks on top of riffs and veering toward thrash metal regularly while staying grounded in its base of hardcore. It's the stuff that the soul craves when it all comes together, such as the incredible title track, ...

  Covid-19 has had an undeniable and major effect on all walks of life, and the music industry is certainly no exception; in an environment where bands have become more and more reliant on touring to sustain them financially, it's not surprising that a lot of bands paused their plans alongside the rest of us as the global pandemic has raged on. With all of the delays, false restarts and uncertainty, it feels like the eventual arrival of Billy Talent's sixth album has been the result of one of the longest album rollouts ever experienced. To put this into perspective, Forgiveness I + II , the album's lead single, was released in November 2019, which means the wait between that single's release and the album drop was only seven months shorter than the wait between the release of Billy Talent's first two albums. Reckless Paradise , the second single, followed in January 2020 while I Beg to Differ (This Will Get Better) came in April. So, in a way, most of the hype surr...

  For a band with such expansive ideas (such as 2019's III , a three part concept album about addiction), The Lumineers more often seem to get by on the bare minimum. Their signature hit, Ho Hey , is about as sparse a smash as has graced the charts over the last decade. Even the aforementioned grandiose concept album couldn't crack forty minutes without bonus tracks. So, it would seem, "less is more" is somewhat of a credo here. Brightside , The Lumineers' fourth album, is no exception; at barely a half hour in length and with only nine songs (one of which is the title track's reprise), there isn't much meat on these bones. Still, the album's title track sets up the possibility that for once more might be more; armed with a dynamic, electric full band sound, Brightside sounds like a band refreshed and willing to go for a more expansive approach. Given more space and time to explore their own possibilities, we might have gotten something to be excited a...

Coming just over seven years after their last album (the post-reunion Glory Under Dangerous Skies ) and nearly a full calendar year after the release of lead single Tarantino , the rollout for End of the Ocean has been long and arduous for fans of the Canadian rock veterans. Due to the myriad of frustrating delays in touring and promotion that a global pandemic brings ( End of the Ocean was originally announced in April with a planned October release), the excitement level for hearing Moist's fifth album has been inevitably dampened somewhat. Four singles had been rolled out over 2021, meaning nearly half of the album is already known by anyone who was paying attention. Thankfully, the remaining tracks blend with those previously released to form another solid outing for Moist. Once again produced by guitarist Mark Makoway, End of the Ocean is a concise and rock-centric nostalgia blast with the kind of energy that begs for the band's oft-delayed tour dates to finally be made...

  My first exposure to English duo Blood Red Shoes was It's Getting Boring By the Sea , an exciting early dance/rock single from their 2008 debut LP. A lot has changed in the sound of Blood Red Shoes over the course of their tenure, and they seem to have gradually gotten glossier and darker album by album. It's only sensible, then, that Ghosts On Tape would be both their glossiest and darkest album to date. Much of the album is soaked in retro gothic hues, like the opening section of Comply (which gets pretty close in overall feel to Nine Inch Nails) and advance singles Morbid Fascination and Murder Me . More rock-minded fans will find a good amount to sink their teeth into as well, as there's a fair amount of snarl and snark in the speedy Give Up , the post-grunge slow burn Begging and the noisy, overdriven I Am Not You . Though it loses a little steam toward the end, Ghosts On Tape succeeds more than it falls short and, as far as soundtracks to the apocalypse go, you c...

  I can't promise that this previously completely rock-centric blog will cover other genres of interest with any kind of regularity, nor can I say with any kind of certainty that I'm qualified to offer insights on genres I don't have as much experience with. What I can say absolutely is that if I'm listening to an album that elicits a reaction and I'm in a position to gather my thoughts as words on the proverbial page, why wouldn't I do it regardless of whether or not it neatly fits into a perceived box? When talking about Run the Jewels' fourth album in 2020, I decided to strive for more diversity and inclusion in my writings, so now that I've decided to revive Sound Bites I feel obligated to make good on the promise I made to myself and to you, dear reader. So with all that said, I never expected to be excited about a new album by The Weeknd, ever; though I'm familiar with a handful of his hits, I hadn't paid much attention to what he was worki...

  From humble alt-rock beginnings upon formation 15 years or so ago, Twin Atlantic have flirted with different levels of mainstream concession most of their career. Upon gaining a sizeable fan base performing a kind of Biffy Clyro cosplay on their home turf (Scotland, as anyone who's heard singer/guitarist Sam McTrusty will easily assertain), they developed their sound to include the occasional big pop hook or plaintive ballad on their 2014 breakthrough Great Divide . They then steered toward a more muscular sound on the underrated GLA in 2017 before releasing the much more pop-centric Power just a couple of months before the world fell into a pandemic-induced stupor. Twin Atlantic's sixth album, then, arrives as we're all still trying to make sense of it all; this is just as true for McTrusty as the rest of us, as Transparency was created in a whirlwind of plague times, fatherhood, Brexit and a host of other adversities, not the least of which being the departure of the g...