Music

I’d love to tell you something – anything – about the lyrical content of Heavy International (Aesthetics), but I can’t stop moving to the damn thing. Seriously. I put it on, and I have to dance like a monkey in the living room, or shadowbox, or jump rope.

Ugh. Okay, let’s get some things out of the way, shall we? At his best, Thomas Lunch sounds like Thomas Dolby doing backing tracks for T. Rex.

Some music is timeless because it captures a mood or emotion so perfectly that it breaks through to the fundamental elements of human experience. The music made by Vancouver, Canada’s Winning is timeless in a more mundane, and arguably gimmicky, way – they play music with no time signature.

Loney, Dear is the moniker of Sweden’s Emil Svanangen. As with many other musicians coming out of the blistering cold of Sweden, Emil is a jack of all trades.

Corny piano and trumpet arrangements abound in the second solo album by Sarah Shannon, former lead singer of ‘90s noise popsters Velocity Girl. Her delightful voice, an instrument that can be dainty as a bell or strong as brass, made Velocity Girl unique in comparison to the standard guitar-driven pop of their day.

As if it isn’t evident enough by the title of their album, Titan plays psychedelic, progressive metal, with an unabashed ’70s flair. The influences of Blue Oyster Cult, Black Sabbath, and Hawkwind emanate from the spacey, jazz-infused, improvisation-based rock.

A manifesto named for the crabs that dwell in the local swamps created – almost out of nothing – a music scene in Recife, capital of Pernambuco state in Brazil’s far northeast, fifteen years ago.

“I’m trying to be heroic.” The first words sung by vocalist Kele Okereke on Bloc Party’s A Weekend in the City (V2 Records) foreshadow the desperation that permeates the entire album.

Legendary Demo (Hydra Head) is an adventure in hard rock. From ’70s blues-rock riffs to hardcore punk to macho stoner metal, Clouds is equally good at all of it.

If the starry-eyed American psychedelic bands of last century saw what their movement had fostered across the Pacific in Japan, they might be a little frightened. A band like Acid Mothers Temple might scare them square, while even a more subdued, earthy group like Ghost would seem unusually alien.

Since when did Elton John come back into vogue? Now that the Scissor Sisters are salivating all over him, a younger generation is being exposed to Sir Elton’s shiny ’70s rock. One might see this as the coming of the apocalypse, but not Baby Teeth’s Abraham Levitan.

It’s hard to imagine what the songwriting process is like for a band like Deerhoof. Their collaborations of inconceivable guitar riffs, Greg Saunier’s chaotic drum patterns, orchestral organs, and child-like keyboards underneath singer/bassist Satomi Matsuzaki’s adorable vocals suggest that Deerhoof have created their own version of music theory in their pajamas.