Album Review: Aseethe – Reverent Burden
Aseethe Reverent Burden aseethecreation.com With its debut full-length, Reverent Burden, Iowa City drone metal outfit Aseethe finally has enough wax to stretch out and show their stuff. The album is comprised of two mysterious, side-long pieces on a vinyl, without track titles or even clearly marked a or b sides. Aseethe opens the longer of...
Album Review/Interview: Oberhofer – Time Capsules II
Brad Oberhofer| 7:00pm | Yacht C lub | $8 | 19+ Even though Brad Oberhofer makes sweeping swathes of ornate, indie-pop, he hardly comes off as the dramatic frontman–with heart stitched on sleeve–he presents on his debut LP, Time Capsules II. Oberhofer spoke fairly quietly, at a measured pace when we talked in mid February. The Novocaine from the...
Featured Artist: Oberhofer
Oberhofer w/ Mumfords, Sudden & Subtle, The Olympics Mar 29 | Yacht Club | 8PM $8 When Brad Oberhofer and his band, Oberhofer, play the Mission Creek Festival, Iowa City will have only had a couple days to soak up the lush, orchestral indie-pop of his debut LP, Time Capsules II. However, when the band...
Will Whitmore, Grand Tetons, Wet Hair announced for Mission Creek 2012
Today, the Mission Creek Festival announced some new confirmations, including local talents Will Whitmore, Grant Tetons and Wet Hair. William Elliott Whitmore cut his teeth strumming a banjo and opening for legendary Iowa City emo-core outfit Ten Grand. More than a decade later, Whitmore has five rough-hewn folk records to his name and sells out...
Black Milk and Tim Hecker added to lineup for Mission Creek 2012
Curtis Cross made his name–Black Milk–in Detroit, twisting the soul sounds of the previous generation around sharp, clean, bass-heavy beats. The J Dilla apostle released a series of ever-improving beat tapes before stepping out from behind his MPCs and synths to grab the mic on 2007’s Popular Demand. Since becoming a double threat, Black Milk...
Album Review: Grand Tetons – They Do Move in Herds
The debut album, They Do Move in Herds, from Grand Tetons is a quintessential 20-something’s album. The quartet has composed a paean to the lost years between college graduation and the “real world.” It’s clear from the opening organ strains of “Honey Don’t Know”—the aural equivalent of the sun cutting through the blinds and peeling...
Album Review: Ex-Action Model – Dropland
Ex-Action Model Dropland Mission Freak Records exactionmodel.com Brendan Hanks’ full-length debut under his long-running nom-de-plume, Ex-Action Model, is a testament to the years Hanks has spent perfecting his programing and sequencing abilities. Dropland is a diverse collection of electronic pieces that manages to cram a wide variety of sounds and textures over the run of...
Little Village's Top Ten Local Albums of 2011 (Thus Far)
If you find yourself marking the calender just waiting for the big regional and national acts to pass through (or near), you may be missing all the wonderful music right under your very nose. Consider this a primer.
Album Review – Wet Hair: In Vogue Spirit
Wet Hair In Vogue Spirit On Wet Hair’s third full-length LP (11th release overall), In Vogue Spirit, the band has embraced many of the same sun-baked sounds of their peers. Where contemporaries like Peaking Lights came at Reggae and dub through the backdoor of drone and noise, Wet Hair has found the middle ground between...
Album Review – Alex Body: Cutting Down Camelot
Alex Body Cutting Down Camelot self-released Since emerging in January 2010, from Twelve Canons’ indefinite hiatus with a self-released CD-r called Just Say Yes, Alex Body has quickly carved out a new shiny identity for himself. His sixth release in under 18 months, Cutting Down Camelot, finds Body heir-apparent to Iowa City’s lo-fi pop throne—watch...
Guided By Voices
Saturday, April 2 – Blue Moose Tap House – $30 advance, $35 door Guided By Voices frontman and its only constant member, Robert Pollard, ended the group’s 18-year tenure in 2003. While Pollard retreated to his four-track recorder in Ohio, a torrent of bands like Times New Viking, No Age and The Vivian Girls would...
Night Vision
DOWNLOAD >> Cola Heavy Nights A New Compilation from Night-People Naked on the Vague – Making Enemies (unreleased–from forthcoming split with Wet Hair) The Twerps – Good Advice (from The Twerps) PC Worship - Staring at the Sun (unreleased) Lazer Zeppelin – This Heart (from Pyramid Echo) The Pheromoans – Stubble Brothers (from The Pheromoans)...
Hallways of Always: Magical Mind
Why would Iowa folkie William Elliott Whitmore and Erase Errata frontwoman Jenny Hoyston re-record the six songs from their 2006 EP Hallways of Always for a vinyl-only release? Only they know for sure, but on their return, this time calling themselves Hallways of Always, the performances do seem sharper.The Wandering Bears
Iowa City indie pop quintet, The Wandering Bears, have offered up a potluck, of sorts, for their self-titled debut. The Bears have cribbed a little bit from nearly every great left-of-center pop act and placed it all in front of you in heaping, steaming, well-produced portions.
The group, comprised of members of...
Pieta Brown – One and All
Local Albums: May 2010 – One and All, the sixth full-length from Pieta Brown, finds the folky at her most relaxed and confident. One and All feels like a commiseration at The Mill: It’s easy, fluid and full of prospective delivered in a comfortable drawl. The album opens with a double-shot of hopeless romanticism. “Wishes...
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