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Little Boots, Nocturnes

2013 | Label: On Repeat / AWAL

By Barry Walters eMusic Contributor

05.07.13 A lot happened very quickly for synth-pop chanteuse Little Boots: Her 2009 debut Hands generated hit UK singles, a gold album, worldwide tours and topped the BBC Sound of 2009 poll. What followed in the ensuing four-year gap between albums wasn’t quite silence: Victoria Hesketh filled it by DJing, making mixtapes and working with more club-oriented cohorts, such as Hercules and Love Affair’s Andy Butler and Simian Mobile Disco’s James Ford. But like her compatriot in ’80s-derived dance-pop La Roux, Boots has distanced herself from her initial hype simply by… more »

Daughter, If You Leave

2013 | Label: Glassnote

By Annie Zaleski eMusic Contributor

04.30.13 The London trio Daughter usually gets filed under folk or indie-folk, but their music bears no traces of strum-and-stomp barnstorming or campfire confessional. The band interprets folk the same way Jason Molina records do: dusky guitars, spare arrangements, sparse beats and anguished vocals thrust into the spotlight. Daughter’s full-length debut, If You Leave, softens this stark foundation with chilly atmospheric effects, lyrics haunted by romantic angst and rebirth, and Elena Tonra’s low-lit voice, which is as hazy and tortured as Chan Marshall sounded on early Cat Power records. The results… more »

Phoenix, Bankrupt!

2013 | Label: Glassnote

By Barry Walters eMusic Contributor

04.23.13 What Phoenix does better than just about any current band is combine the euphoria of a raucous rock ‘n’ roll show with the surgical exactitude of studio-crafted dance music. Mixing the obstreperousness of old-fashioned guitar/bass/drums/keys grooves with hyper-precise digital calibration, this supremely, this supremely French foursome remains the epitome of rock-disco dialectic.

Their new one picks up where 2009′s mainstream breakthrough Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix left off, maintaining that album’s crowd-pleasing formula while accentuating the group’s gentle waywardness. The lyrics, for example, are often nonsensical: “Victory lap, formal with feathery eyes/ Dating… more »

Laura Stevenson, Wheel

2013 | Label: Don Giovanni Records / Believe Digital

By Rachael Maddux eMusic Contributor

04.23.13 A question lurks in the background of Laura Stevenson’s Wheel like a party guest invited out of obscure but unbreakable obligation: Once you realize you are going to die, what are you supposed to do about the rest of your life?

From a distance, Stevenson’s songs seem to tally up the standard frayed relationships and rocky familyscapes; up close, in flashes of quiet brutality, she makes the stakes clear. “There was a time when we believed that we could measure out a line just how we wanted it, so we could… more »