The Hives - The Black and White Album [2007]
Posted by admin on July 7th, 2008
Time and time again, the Hives have shown that they can crank out consistent, and consistently fun, garage rock. The Black and White Album’s title alludes to the band’s strict formulas for everything from color codes to dress codes to cleverly structured dumb rock, yet this is the album where the Hives break away from their routine — they add some gray to the mix. At this point in their career, it’s understandable that they’d want to break out of the mold, at least occasionally, even if they are the experts at honed, toned garage-punk. To that end, the band recorded with a host of different producers, Read the rest of this entry »
Pop-punk practitioners rarely make it to a third album without declaring some sort of newfound sensibility — they’re going a little darker, say, or they’re experimenting with a dancier sound. But Simple Plan stick to pretty familiar territory on album three, which maybe explains the unclever self-title: perhaps the plan for this one really is simple. The Montreal boys pound away at full speed here, cranking out a batch of short, frivolous songs that showcase Pierre Bouvier’s nasal but weirdly appealing voice and one, “I Can Wait Forever,” that seems to be rooted in real feeling. The whining hasn’t let up (see “No Love” and “Generation”), but the fun hasn’t either. Credit the producers: 
Plain White T’s delivers a solid cd of emo & pop-punk tracks. My favorites include “It’s Our Time”, “Making a Memory”, and “Hey There Delilah”. The best aspect of this cd, to me, is the perfect “warm-weather drive”-ness. It is an excellent cd for rolling all the windows down and singing along with when you are driving about. Every track has a great sing-along aspect. It has catchy, upbeat songs, and a few slower acoustics. It’s a very enjoyable cd, but nothing groundbreaking or remarkable that sets it apart. For the current price ($9.99), there is no harm in picking it up and keeping it in the cd case for those summer days! 
The debut album from these California skate punks taps into the usual new-millennium worries: teenage alienation, misunderstood intentions, a quest for the perfect high. It’s not very original and pretty short on ideas overall. The best song, “Heaven Is a Halfpipe,” lifts its hip-hop/ska style and motivation from Sublime, which should give you a reference point on this jugheaded effort. Review by Michael Gallucci @ allmusic.com
This is a very good DVD, a well-rounded selection from the Foo’s first four albums, and the fact that the disc starts right into the concert footage is great. The music is fantastic and, in particular, Taylor Hawkins on drums is just about perfect. The only real weakness is, well, Dave Grohl’s voice. Let’s just say his voice in studio and on the individual albums is great. Out of studio and on stage……ummmmmm, not so good. To listen to him try to belt out ‘Aurora’ at the Toronto show…..ugh. Painful stuff. You could almost believe they pulled some random dude out of the crowd and let him try to sing it. I love this band, I will always love this band and will buy whatever album they ever put out, but I think I’ll pass on the live stuff. 
Alkaline Trio added some extra gloom to pop-punk with their almost perfect debut, Goddamnit! Spinning tales of doomed romance, this Chicago three-piece hit too close to home with its stories of obsessive crushes, messy breakups, and alcoholism. Lyrically, Maybe I’ll Catch Fire follows in the footsteps of Goddamnit!, while staying true to the elaborate but emotional tone of aggressive pop-punk. Not as essential as the Trio’s previous efforts, but it would be difficult for any band to follow up an album like Goddamnit! Review by Mike DaRonco @ allmusic.com 
These “gypsy punks,” as the band jubilantly describes itself, were once precisely that, a spectacular clash of cultures that smashed the exuberance of Ukrainian gypsy music and the pounding rhythms and exhilarating fire of Slavic folk, with the roar of punk rock. That was then, but now globalization has got them in its grip, and Gogol Bordello set about crashing through national boundaries, reconnecting the cultural links borders have severed. If a fire and fury for life fed the soul of the gypsy, the Slav, and the punk, it also lay at the heart of hard rock and heavy metal, and so into the meat grinder goes incendiary lead guitar. Flamingo’s fire lies in its emotive 
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