Review Roundup - October 2013

Album reviews are sooo boring! Unless you're talking about BitCandy album reviews, that is. We pride ourselves on telling it like it is, even if that means pissing off a fan or two! This month, we've been loving Nine Inch Nails, Mountain Range, The Weeknd, Elvis Costello and Icona Pop, but we've also been hating a whole lot, too. We're looking at y'all, Islands, Deer Tick, Grouplove, Haim and MGMT! You've all been inducted in to The Posers Club this month. You're sooo very welcome!

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Nine Inch Nails - Hestitation Marks - 8.5

“Let's get context out of the way: Nine Inch Nails haven't made a 'real' album in almost five years and it was the third of three modern albums Trent Reznor made in the 2000's and their farewell tour in 2009 signified the end of that era. With Hesitation Marks, Reznor is back to wearing the Nine Inch Nails hat, after a tour with his wife's band How to Destroy Angels. Back also is the blinding live performances and an album that manages to not only fit into the Nails pantheon, but push its way past some of its predecessors (read more...)”

Mountain Range - Adjustments EP - 9.1

“Let's kick this review off with a very bold statement: I've never really understood the point of instrumental music. I mean, what's music without lyrics anyway?! Just noise, really. But let me rephrase: I've never really understood the point of instrumental music until I heard this EP. Being the first thing I've heard from British beat-architect Mountain Range, it's pretty easy to credit my new found love for ambient electro to these 4 tracks. Think I'm spitting a pile of horse crap? Well, take a thorough listen to Adjustments and then tell me who smells of horse crap (read more...)”

Arctic Monkeys - AM - 7.8

“The most hyped album of 2013 (for me anyway) has finally arrived! Now fuck the hype and let's hear the truth from someone who's been listening to nothing but this album for the past week. From the opening track to the very end, it's one big, sexy trip. Listening to this album makes me want to break out whatever drugs, booze and girls I can find and get down and dirty until the sun comes up. It's a slow, smooth ride with epic guitar solos, clever verses and a smouldering sound that doesn't come close to anything else we've heard this year (read more...)”

The Weeknd - Kiss Land - 8.7

“Here's everything you need to know about The Weeknd's highly anticipated follow up to whatever we decided to call  Trilogy (a.k.a. House of Balloons, Thursday, and Echoes of Silence): It's fantastic. Everything you liked from those previous work is here. Except this time around it's crisper, more concise, and frankly none of the songs feel like b-sides. It's bigger, better, badder, etc. If there's any complaints to be had, it's that Tesfaye gave the lone guest spot on the record to the softest rapper in the known world (read more...)”

2 Chainz - B.O.A.T.S. 2: Me Time  - 7.5

“B.O.A.T.S. 2: Me Time is the follow up to 2012's surprise success Based On a T.R.U. Story (so now you know what the B.O.A.T.S. acronym stands for) and the rapper formerly known as Tity Boi knows better than to mess with a successful formula. B.O.A.T.S. 2 is jam packed with ready-made singles like 'Netflix' that recall a bygone era in which mainstream rappers were actually trying to make music for the masses, as oppose to just being weird and trying to freak out the white establishment (read more...)”

MGMT - MGMT - 2.5

“MGMT would be groundbreaking if it had been recorded in 1967. It's got some of the psych and none of the pop of Oracular. It's even more misguided than Congratulations. It sounds a lot like Pink Floyd with Syd Barrett crashed into the Beach Boys circa Pet Sounds, but not in a good way, in a horrible fiery wreck with multiple casualties kind of way. I've listened to MGMT three times now. Three times just to try and glean a little bit of insight into what MGMT was trying to achieve here. I still have no idea. There's no cohesion, at all (read more...)”

Elvis Costello and The Roots - Wise Up Ghost - 8.9

“Elvis Costello is a mainstay of groovy, soul-fueled rock and roll music. Since 1977's My Aim is True the bespectacled rocker with the steady, unwavering voice has been an unmistakable and unmoving presence on the world music stage. However, this is decidedly not the Costello of yesteryear. Wise Up Ghost showcases Elvis through his most topical and most sincere music in years. Crafting a thoughtfully balanced blend of old and new, rock and hip-hop, Costello weaves through discussions about fear, politics, the military, faith and patriotism (read more...)”

Islands - Ski Mask - 6

“With each subsequent Islands' new album release, Ski Mask being this fifth such release, I find myself hurriedly burning through it in search of a song in the same stratosphere as 'Swans (Life After Death).' Unfortunately, Ski Mask doesn't have any such songs, although opener 'Wave Forms' is probably the closest they've come, and by they, I of course mean mercurial frontman/Islands only constant Nick Thorburn. The singer formerly known as Nick Diamonds seems to be constantly haunted by past achievements (read more...)”

Bill Callahan - Dream River - 8.2

“We spend entirely too much time trying to explain why we like things, often for reasons that don't make any sense. Our need to explain things, to give a narrative to our life, is a disease. Kill it before it kills you. For instance, I find myself enthralled with Bill Callahan's new record, Dream River, his fifth under his Christian name, his 18th overall counting all those ones he put out as Smog. I'm not entirely sure why, and the harder I try to come up with a rationale, the more I feel my like for said record dissipating. This is not an uncommon occurrence for me (read more...)”

Icona Pop - This Is - 8.6

“Icona Pop is Caroline Hjelt (the butterface redhead) and Aino Jawo (think a more boyish T Boz). And now that I think of it, I suppose part of the guilt free listening to Icona Pop is that these girls are not picture perfect teeny bopper models. I mean, even NME has written up favorable stories on the power punk pop girlies. Like, be real. Would you listen to and adore these songs if Nicole Scherzzzinger was singing them? What about Selena Gomez? You see. Probably not. The imperfect hotness of them makes them even more sexy (read more...)”

Drake - Nothing Was The Same - 7

“Everyone keeps saying this is his Drakeiest record yet and we all immediately know what that means. How did we get here? Seriously. How the f**k did we get here? For those of you scoring at home, the bottom for Drake was landing a leading role on Canadian TV show Degrassi: The Next Generation at the age of 15. Sure there was that real life mess of his parents divorce and father's short-term imprisonment, because Drake is always vulnerable, but never intimate. But 'Started From the Bottom' isn't really about that. It's not about real shit (read more...)”

Deertick - Negativity - 2.3

“By most any objective measure, Negativity is a bad album. It's redundant, stale, and just about every other prejorative adjective you could throw at it. Spare 'The Rock' and maybe 'The Dream's In the Ditch,' this is a shit sandwich. Particularly 'Just Friends,' a song McCauley wrote about seeing his ex-fiancé at a bar one night. This song plays like a bad South Park song, only without the humor and self-awareness. Or maybe I'm just having a bad September. The rest of Negativity is more of the same. A hackneyed, extended meditation on the band's sole motif (read more...)”

Grouplove - Spreading Rumours - 4.5

“It's now the norm for indie acts to get their big break through television ads. This was the case for Grouplove, who's obnoxiously catchy single 'Tongue Tied' was featured in an Apple commercial showing how much more fun your friends can be if they all had an iPod Touch. Spreading Rumours is the follow up to 2011's Never Trust a Happy Song, which was packed with solid singles that begged you to sing along, and I wish I could say the same for this one. There are some pretty good tracks sprinkled throughout the album, but there were times where it felt like a chore (read more...)”

Haim - Days Are Gone - 3.1

“The only thing you probably need to know about Haim and their forthcoming album, Days Are Gone, is the first note I wrote about the music in the first part of the first song that I made during my first listen-through: 'Music for moms.' Haim is comprised of three young, pretty, 'hip' sisters (and some random dude). It seems as though nothing can be written in the perpetual music hype machine without at least mentioning that angle; which in and of itself should be a warning sign that the music is not interesting or good enough to stand on its own (read more...)”

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We appreciate y'all tuning in to this month's Review Roundup, hipsters! If y'all disagree with any of our points, then feel free to leave hate mail in the comments below, or over at the individual review!