By Andy Battaglia, eMusic ContributorIn its serious, almost spiritual commitment to repetition, Slava's vertiginous dance music takes cues from the Chicago-borne "footwork" sound. Many of the tracks on Raw Solutions, the Moscow-born, Chicago-raised, Brooklyn-based DJ/producer's debut album, take a… more »
By Andrew Perry, eMusic Contributor[Charles Bradley turned heads and broke hearts with his 2011 triumph No Time for Dreaming. On the advent of his second masterpiece, the scorching, searing, Victim of Love, we invited Bradley and his bandleader and… more »
By Barry Walters, eMusic ContributorCharles Bradley is not the kind of guy to sing of love in fantastical terms; he's much too real for that. Bearing a voice streaked with the ravages of inner torment, this nomadic 64-year-old soul… more »
By Ashley Melzer, eMusic ContributorCribbing a line from the Man in Black, Phosphorescent's Matthew Houck sings of those that "say love is a burning thing." Whatever that feeling was that Cash knew so well, Houck has never felt it.… more »
By Austin L. Ray, eMusic ContributorEach of the last three years has produced a new album from Brooklyn's The Men, and each of those albums has only increased the cultish glow of adoration for the fervent rock band, which has… more »
By Matthew Fritch, eMusic ContributorBeach Fossils singer/songwriter Dustin Payseur is talking about his generation; he just sounds like a relic from 1980s post-punk England doing it. His friends are doing it, too, to the point where you can argue… more »
By Rachael Maddux, eMusic ContributorThe first two minutes of Lady Lamb the Beekeeper's Ripely Pine seem to reinforce the notion of fragile acquiescence that 23-year-old Aly Spaltro's stage name suggests. "Take me by the arm to the altar/ Take… more »
By Andy Battaglia, eMusic ContributorBuke and Gase certainly don't lack novelty, but they also don't sit back and let that novelty do their work for them. The New York duo's instruments are self-styled and handmade — the "buke," a… more »
By Andy Beta, eMusic ContributorDespite nearly a decade spent in the industrial confines of their North Brooklyn neighborhood of Greenpoint, the sound that Mountains — a duo comprised of Koen Holtkamp and Brendan Anderegg — evoke is positively bucolic.… more »
By Alex Naidus, eMusic ContributorAlmanac, the second album from Brooklyn's Widowspeak, features full, traditional rock-band instrumentation, but at the core, the band remains a duo: Vocalist Molly Hamilton's commanding coo and guitarist Robert Earl Thomas's sinewy, layered playing comprise… more »
By Justin Davidson, eMusic ContributorIt's a wonderful thing to be talented, versatile, 30-ish, well connected and living in Brooklyn, where your neighbors are likewise talented, versatile, 30-ish, and well connected — where you are, in fact, among their most… more »
By Christina Lee, eMusic Contributor[Rock history is full of albums that document breakups, but few of them are as ruthlessly recounted as the one that inspired Sharon Van Etten's devastating third album, Tramp. Beating her fretboard into a spear,… more »
By Richard Gehr, eMusic ContributorYoung Brooklyn composer Missy Mazzoli's exhilarating and ultimately heartbreaking Song from the Uproar contains traditional operatic elements – among them, romance, tragedy and cross-dressing. However, the story of the real-life Isabelle Eberhardt (1877-1904), who traveled… more »
By J. Edward Keyes, Editor-in-ChiefAnyone looking for a shorthand to describe the devil-may-care attitude pervading Light Up Gold, the irresistible debut from Brooklyn band Parquet Courts, will find it 24 seconds into the first song, when Austin Brown first… more »
By Richard Gehr, eMusic ContributorThe Larson sisters met third Prince Rama co-founder Michael Collins while living in the world's large largest Hare Krishna community and attending high school in Alachua, Florida. The trio's self-described "Blink 182 rip-off band" evolved… more »
By Laura Leebove, Deputy Editor"It's good to be back in your intimidating city," Ani DiFranco said on stage Friday night at Brooklyn's Music Hall of Williamsburg. "It makes me feel old." DiFranco spent the early part of her career… more »
By Matthew Fritch, eMusic ContributorOnly in the hyper-insular Brooklyn scene and its attendant fantasy-rock blogosphere could the Babies be considered a "supergroup." The band was formed by Vivian Girls singer/guitarist Cassie Ramone and Woods bassist Kevin Morby, whose combined… more »
By Laura Studarus, eMusic ContributorThe conceit for Brooklyn art-duo Prince Rama's sixth album goes like this: Life as we know it finally ends in the long-promised apocalypse. But lucky for us, Prince Rama has provided a glimpse into the… more »
By Douglas Wolk, eMusic ContributorOne of the most thrilling debuts of the year, Parquet Courts' Light Up Gold goes back to the first principles of punk that get forgotten every so often: speed, precision, brains and attitude. The group… more »
By Richard Gehr, eMusic ContributorOn her sixth album, guitar-thwacking virtuoso Kaki King loops back to basics with her first all-instrumental release since Everybody Loves You, her 2002 debut. As an artistic reboot, Glow confidently recapitulates a decade of development.… more »
By Richard Gehr, eMusic ContributorSporting fingerless black leather gloves, a sleeveless festival T-shirt, woven armbands, shell necklace, and a full grass skirt, Janka Nabay looked the perfect Afro-Brooklyn expatriate hybrid during his opening set for Syrian dabke star Omar… more »
By Annie Zaleski, eMusic ContributorThe adjectives generally used to describe Matt & Kim lean toward some variation of "cheerful," mainly because everything about the Brooklyn pair – from their perma-grins and party-kickstarting electropop to their idyllic relationship – is… more »
By Kate Silver, eMusic ContributorDeath does not become Paul Auster but, in this memoir, it consumes him. In January 2011, one month before his 64th birthday, the author started this journal. In a lucid, second-person narrative, Auster contemplates being… more »
By Mike Powell, eMusic ContributorSporting black leather jackets, bright red lipstick and hangdog poses, Dum Dum Girls resemble high-school dropouts from another time – the '50s, maybe; or maybe it's the '60s; or maybe it's the '80s. Whenever it… more »