ALARM

This Week’s Best Single: Trentemøller’s Shades Of Marble Remixes

Guest Playlist: Ponytail’s breezy springtime tunes

Ponytail: Do Whatever You Want All the Time (We Are Free, 4/12/11)

Ponytail: “Easy Peasy”

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After a brief hiatus in 2010, Baltimore art-rock band Ponytail released its third album, Do Whatever You Want All the Time, on longtime record label We Are Free. Its psychedelic artwork, created by Yamantaka Eye of Japanese rock band Boredoms, is matched by the band’s manic vocals and guitar-driven melodies.

In honor of the changing seasons, Ponytail guitarist Ken Seeno shows the band’s more chilled-out side with this ultra laid-back playlist.

A Warm Spring Breeze Blowing Through My Window
by Ken Seeno of Ponytail

1. The Revolutionaries: “Leftist”

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A deep, smooth, bouncy groove made by the masters of Channel One. All sway and smiles. Today is a good day.

Concert Photos: Battles @ Lincoln Hall (Chicago, IL)

With its first release since former loop maestro / singer Tyondai Braxton left the band last year, experimental-rock band Battles is pounding the pavement, touring its new material from Gloss Drop, out June 7 via Warp. Guest vocalists on the record include Yamantaka Eye (Boredoms), Matias Aguayo, Gary Numan, and Kazu Makino (Blonde Redhead), and for this tour, the group found an interesting way to bring them along (see below). These shots, from photographer Wallo Villacorta, are from the band’s recent stop in Chicago at Lincoln Hall.

Q&A: Sharon Van Etten

Sharon Van Etten: Epic (Ba Da Bing, 9/21/10)

Sharon Van Etten: “Don’t Do It”

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Singer/songwriter Sharon Van Etten was raised in a cozy New Jersey burg named Nutley. She grew up, ventured out on her own, moved to Tennessee — and had her heart broken by a man who made her doubt her own talent. As a result, she came crawling back to her parents’ basement to piece together what went wrong, and there Van Etten found solace in songwriting. Her two major releases — Because I Was In Love (Language of Stone, 2009) and Epic (Ba Da Bing, 2010) — are the byproducts of a person aiming to find a foothold sturdy enough to climb back into the world.

Van Etten’s songs are un-flashy yet sincere, allowing her to build a loyal following in the slow, old-fashioned manner of connecting with people in that place where our emotions overlap. After months of touring, she is planning to disappear into a studio this summer to finally finish her third album with producer Aaron Dessner of The National. From her home in Brooklyn, Van Etten spoke with ALARM about songs, tattoos, wine, faeries, and Fleetwood Mac.

The openness of your songwriting seems to give your fans the impression that they’re allowed to open up to you. Do you feel an obligation to these strangers who tell you that you’ve “helped” them with your music?

It means a lot to me to know that my music connects with other people. That’s why I do it. I do it for me, but I would be completely selfish if I didn’t do it for other people as well. It’s encouraging to hear it. I do feel a certain sense of responsibility to be a positive influence on people, especially since I’m realizing that a lot of people that I’ve met who can relate to my music are younger women seeking advice after getting their heart broken for the first time. I feel pressure because they’re seeking my advice, and sometimes I feel like a fraud. I’m just like, “I don’t really know.” I’m still figuring these things out.

Q&A: A Lull

A Lull: Confetti (Mush, 4/12/11)

A Lull: “Some Love”

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Since its formation in 2008, indie electronic quintet A Lull has expanded its lineup and grown into a much louder and more textured unit. After experimentation with a plethora of objects and instruments, the Chicago band has crafted a sonic landscape that’s truly its own. Between thumping rhythms, trance-like vocals, and layers of percussion, A Lull’s debut album, Confetti, pulsates from start to finish.

The band’s live performances are equally infectious in energy. Before Confetti‘s record-release show, two-fifths of A Lull — Nigel Dennis and Todd Miller — discussed making the album and how the music will translate live.

There is definite progression between the Ice Cream Bones EP (2009) and Confetti. What kind of growth did you experience between these releases? Or what did you feel was missing with the EP and the smaller lineup?

TM: [Ice Cream Bones] was pretty early on in the recording process, and those were kind of the first five songs that we got finished, and I think we were just trying to figure out what we sounded like. After that EP, we kept trying to figure out what we sounded like, and I think we all just kind of moved more towards a much louder sound.

ND: I think it also came from playing live together. When we wrote the EP, we hadn’t really played live that much — our first show was December of 2008, and the EP came out in May [of 2009]. But when we were recording that EP, we had the songs already written to play them live in December. We’d extend a song and make it a lot crazier on drums and sort of build on that — so it naturally happened.

The Metal Examiner: A Storm Of Light’s As the Valley of Death Becomes Us, Our Silver Memories Fade

Every Friday, The Metal Examiner delves metal’s endless depths to present the genre’s most important and exciting albums.

A Storm Of Light: As the Valley of Death Becomes Us, Our Silver Memories Fade (Profound Lore, 5/17/11)

A Storm Of Light: “Destroyer”

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Since its inception, Josh Graham’s A Storm Of Light has adopted a model that’s based squarely on collective evolution, be it in something as complex as its musical aspirations or something as simple as its personnel. With its fourth release, As the Valley of Death Becomes Us, Our Silver Memories Fade, the group seemingly moves a little further from its loose “project” designation yet seemingly keeps the “band” label at arm’s length.

With its sound rooted firmly in no-frills rock, Valley’s style could best be described as “talk metal” or, barring that, “verbal doom.” Graham’s vocals tend to avoid conventional melody, or at least anything too advanced, instead coming off more as pitched declarations of ideology over the anvil attack of bassist Dominic Seita and newcomer drummer B.J. Graves. Though the obvious comparisons to contemporaries Neurosis or Unsane will make sense, Valley really borrows more heavily from mid-1990s hard rock — the half-spoken, hard-truth heaviness of Rollins Band, or the sludgy Sabbath nods of Soundgarden (fittingly, guitarist Kim Thayil pops in for a pair of guest spots: “Missing” and “Black Wolves”). The chugging “Collapse” evokes a less tom-reliant form of Tool, and the environmentalist-turned-existentialist “Destroyer” finally explains what a Queensrÿche / Alice in Chains / Rage Against the Machine collaboration might have sounded like.

Concert Photos: Mogwai @ Metro (Chicago, IL)

It has been more than 15 years since Glaswegian post-rock quintet Mogwai formed, and since that time, its lineup and its sound have remained largely unaltered. Gradual, measured sonic evolution has been the key to longevity — not abrupt reinvention. On its most recent album, Hardcore Will Never Die, the band reprises its signature, crushing reverb, glimmering keyboard lines, and steady beats. Joining Mogwai in a recent performance in Chicago was Errors, a Scottish instrumental-rock band that’s signed to Mogwai’s own Rock Action Records. ALARM contributing photographer Drew Reynolds snapped these shots.