I love this band so much that even though my bandmate Jason gave me a downloaded copy of The Kick and the Snare a few weeks ago, as soon as it was available for purchase on their website, I bought it. I am also attempting to sneak the review past my editor.

Before I listened to this CD, I read the liner notes and found that Texas One Ten was inspired by and dedicated to the mother of Bryan Jones (drums, vocals), who had passed away just before the recording process. I already felt like a cloud would be raining depression over every track, but as I listened, I realized that the album was not a train wreck, but a celebration of life and everything that comes with it.

Huzzah! I cast you awash into a jumble of black metal, tough guy, and Dimebag Darrell-emulating riffage! You are now swimming smack-dab in the middle of the Monarch self-titled album.

13 & God is the first collaborative effort between The Notwist and Anticon’s Themselves, which ultimately doesn’t sound like a collaboration at all. What you wind up with is a polarized record between tracks that essentially sound like they belong to The Notwist or Themselves.

Howard Hello is the latest project from Kenseth Thibideau, a former member of Tarentel, and Marty Anderson (Lazarus, Dilute). Following Tarentel’s success, Thibadeau left the band and now plays keys and bass for Pinback.

First of all, I don’t listen to hardcore much. I’ll go see my friends’ bands and when one of them puts something out, I will give it a few listens. Oh yeah, I really love Uniform Choice’s first album (my hardcore/straightedge coworkers find this amusing). As far as hardcore goes, We’re Unstoppable is pretty accessible, so that means it probably sucks.

It’s scary that I have the option now of being glib about Cut City’s resemblance to Gang of Four and Wire, considering I was nowhere near cool (or old) enough to have listened to those bands the first time around. Still, the return of the sound has become such a phenomenon with the success of Interpol that I now know the echoes when I hear them.

If this weren’t an EP it would be dubbed the “Official House Cleaning CD of 2005,” but as it were it takes me more than the 25 minutes that make up this CDEP to clean my house. With seven members behind Parlour , you’d expect the music to have a lot going on, and you would be right.

Hella has always been one of those bands to which I can’t completely commit. I’ve had the opportunity to see them locally for free numerous times, but they still end up losing out to “The Shield” or a Yankees game.

A former member of The Make-Up and Nation of Ulysses plus the auxiliary drummer of Fugazi unite to bring you a hodgepodge of mostly palatable pop. If you’ve been following Dischord’s more recent output, the mediocrity of this release is hardly surprising, though still disappointing.

The follow up to Alaska!’s debut record a few years ago has met this set of ears with mixed feelings. While their debut was the collaborative (although at times long-distance) work of bassist Russ Pollard and guitarist Imaad Wasif, Rescue Through Tomahawk appears to have been written mainly by Wasif.

It’s ironic that a lot of what was considered progressive in the 70s is still considered such today. I dare you to listen to, say, King Crimson’s Lark’s Tongues in Aspic and tell me that in 2005 we’re beyond that.