Arriving on a wave of well-earned hype rooted in tight chops and a confident swagger, the Strokes offer a rock & roll antidote to the plague of boy bands, teen divas, and petulant rap-rock outfits. Despite this quintet’s prep-school background, their sound comes from the same primordial ooze that spawned Big Apple legends like the New York Dolls and the Velvet Underground.

Clocking in at 36 minutes, IS THIS IT packs its perfect length with stellar songs that draw inspiration from all over the map. Among the many highlights are “Last Nite” with its insistent Motown backbeat and choppy Johnny Thunders-like guitar solo, “Barely Legal,” sounding like 1980s-era Cure fronted by a saucy Iggy Pop, and the jangly “Someday” with its hairshirt of vulnerability from a bad break-up. While frontman Julian Casablancas (son of Elite Models founder John) drawls like Lou Reed through a busted intercom, guitarists Nick Valensi and Albert Hammond Jr. do Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd proud as their sinewy chords intertwine to great effect on the angular “The Modern Age” and equally neurotic “Alone, Together.” Thanks to the Strokes, rumors of rock & roll’s demise appear to have been greatly exaggerated.

Tracklisting
1. Is This It
2. The Modern Age
3. Soma
4. Barely Legal
5. Someday
6. Alone, Together
7. Last Nite
8. Hard To Explain
9. New York City Cops
10. Trying Your Luck
11. Take It Or Leave It

Professional Reviews
Rolling Stone (4/11/02, p.108) – Ranked #49 in Rolling Stone’s “50 Coolest Records”.

Rolling Stone (1/03/02, p.119) – Ranked #8 in Rolling Stone’s “Top 10 2001″.

Rolling Stone (10/11/01, pp.89-90) – 4 stars out of 5 – “…Pure New York rock & roll: all gray-pavement aggression wrapped in black-leather cool….The music leaves no doubts – more joyful and intense than anything else…heard this year.”

Rolling Stone (4/11/02, p.108) – Ranked #49 in Rolling Stone’s “50 Coolest Records”.

Rolling Stone (1/03/02, p.119) – Ranked #8 in Rolling Stone’s “Top 10 2001″.

Rolling Stone (10/11/01, pp.89-90) – 4 stars out of 5 – “…Pure New York rock & roll: all gray-pavement aggression wrapped in black-leather cool….The music leaves no doubts – more joyful and intense than anything else…heard this year.”

Spin (1/02, p.77) – Ranked #18 in Spin’s “Albums of the Year 2001″ – “…Super-catchy songs that make you wanna pogo…the male Elastica!”

Spin (1/02, p.77) – Ranked #18 in Spin’s “Albums of the Year 2001″ – “…Super-catchy songs that make you wanna pogo…the male Elastica!”

Entertainment Weekly (12/28/01, p.136) – Ranked #1 “Album of the Year”.

Entertainment Weekly (9/28/01, pp.71-2) – “…A blur of sooty grit and grind…” – Rating: A-

Entertainment Weekly (12/28/01, p.136) – Ranked #1 “Album of the Year”.

Entertainment Weekly (9/28/01, pp.71-2) – “…A blur of sooty grit and grind…” – Rating: A-

Q (9/01, p.120) – 5 stars out of 5 – “…A breathless, goggle-eyed, assuredly brilliant album…it works wonders.”

Q (9/01, p.120) – 5 stars out of 5 – “…A breathless, goggle-eyed, assuredly brilliant album…it works wonders.”

Alternative Press (2/02, p.65) – Ranked #25 in AP’s “25 Best Albums of 2001″.

Alternative Press (2/02, p.65) – Ranked #25 in AP’s “25 Best Albums of 2001″.

Magnet (12-1/02, p.57) – Included in Magnet’s “20 Best Albums of 2001″.

Magnet (12-1/02, p.57) – Included in Magnet’s “20 Best Albums of 2001″.

CMJ (10/15/01, p.6) – “…One big rock’n'roll orgy…”

CMJ (10/15/01, p.6) – “…One big rock’n'roll orgy…”

Mojo (Publisher) (p.63) – Ranked #33 in Mojo’s “100 Modern Classics” — “Rattled together hastily, The Strokes’ debut captured the Bowery-basement cool of ‘their moment’.”

Mojo (Publisher) (1/02, p.69) – Ranked #3 in Mojo’s “Best [40] Albums of 2001″.

Mojo (Publisher) (9/01, p.97) – “…A heartily uplifting brew of scruffy street style, swear words and stammering pop tunes which sweat musical history…and sound infuriatingly easy to make…”

Mojo (Publisher) (1/02, p.69) – Ranked #3 in Mojo’s “Best [40] Albums of 2001″.

Mojo (Publisher) (9/01, p.97) – “…A heartily uplifting brew of scruffy street style, swear words and stammering pop tunes which sweat musical history…and sound infuriatingly easy to make…”

NME (Magazine) (12/29/01, p.59) – Ranked #1 in NME’s 50 “Albums Of the Year 2001″.

NME (Magazine) (8/25/01, p.49) – 10 out of 10 – “…Concise and elegant rock music by 5 young men….Indispensable….There’s nothing unnecessary here…”

NME (Magazine) (12/29/01, p.59) – Ranked #1 in NME’s 50 “Albums Of the Year 2001″.

NME (Magazine) (8/25/01, p.49) – 10 out of 10 – “…Concise and elegant rock music by 5 young men….Indispensable….There’s nothing unnecessary here…”

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The Strokes – Room On Fire

Houdini is about as close as one gets to a representative Melvins album, and it vividly captures the band’s unreconstructed power, vision, and musical strangeness.

Tracklisting
1. Hooch
2. Night Goat
3. Lizzy
4. Going Blind
5. Honey Bucket
6. Hag Me
7. Set Me Straight
8. Sky Pup
9. Joan Of Arc
10. Teet
11. Copache
12. Pearl Bomb
13. Spread Eagle Beagle

Professional Reviews
Spin (11/93, p.133) – Highly Recommended – “…A few sections on [HOUDINI] are recorded so hot that the guitar distortion literally breaks up into white noise in your speakers: the hits are classic Melvins tuneage, which means they’ll make you wonder if the batteries are going dead in your radio…”

Musician (11/93, p.13) – “…[HOUDINI] is a slow-motion barrage of buzzsaw noize apocalypso, with tracks like “Pearl Bomb” achieving a formal brilliance that slams together the Ramones, Stooges, Glenn Branca and Rhys Chatham….”

Since the ’90s, the Deftones have clawed out their own specialized niche in music. Many have imitated them, but few have reached their heights. They were innovators of so-called nu metal and could easily have settled into complacency riding the wave they helped create. Instead they continue to make waves with their self-titled fourth album.

Deftones frontman Chino Moreno wastes no time in expressing his despair mere seconds into “Hexagram” with a blood-curdling scream that will make your skin crawl. The dense, down-tuned guitars of Stephen Carpenter form a solid backdrop for the vocals that’s more about creating a mood than a melody (”When Girls Telephone Boys”). Ironically one of the album’s most intense moments (”Lucky You”) doesn’t even involve guitar, it relies on Nine Inch Nails-type rhythm and keyboards to create an uncomfortable tension. DEFTONES winds down with the loud-soft-loud pattern they’re famous for on “Moana.”

Tracklisting
1. Hexagram
2. Needles And Pins
3. Minerva
4. Good Morning Beautiful
5. Deathblow
6. When Girls Telephone Boys
7. Battle-axe
8. Lucky You
9. Bloody Cape
10. Anniversary Of An Uninteresting Event
11. Moana

Professional Reviews
Rolling Stone (5/29/03, p.60) – 4 stars out of 5 – “…This is metal that crushes, then soothes; collapses, then soars…”

Spin (7/03, p.105) – “…With DEFTONES, they’ve built a cathedral of suffering, filled to the rafters with agony, awe, and terror…” – Grade: B

CMJ (6/2/03, p.6) – “…These compositions are messy and contained, quiet and loud, aggressive and vulnerable–often within a single breath…”

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Deftones – Around the Fur

In 2000, a small wave of British pop bands clearly heavily influenced by Radiohead’s brand of anthemic mope rock arose, with Travis, Muse, and Coldplay at the forefront. Coldplay are the most clearly Radiohead-like, compared to the poppier Travis and the more electronic-oriented Muse, and their US debut, the 10-song PARACHUTES, should appeal to any fans of OK COMPUTER or THE BENDS who found KID A too weird for their tastes. (Coldplay even swipe a song title, “Don’t Panic,” from Douglas Adams, as Radiohead did with “Paranoid Android.)

The soaring yet depressing single “Shiver” is a masterpiece of swelling emotion, and the fact that the other nine tracks, even the instrumental fragment of a title track, sound like variations on its theme is more a matter of conceptual and musical unity than a lack of ideas. This album deserves the hype it got on release.

Tracklisting
1. Don’t Panic
2. Shiver
3. Spies
4. Sparks
5. Yellow
6. Trouble
7. Parachutes
8. High Speed
9. We Never Change
10. Everything’s Not Lost

Professional Reviews
Rolling Stone (10/26/00, p.111) – 3.5 stars out of 5 – “…Straight-ahead, melodic Brit pop that strives for ’significance’ with a capial ’s’….[The album] rises above its influences to become a work of real transcendence…”

Spin (1/01, p.73) – Ranked #19 in Spin’s “Top 20 Albums of the Year [2000]” – “…[They] hoist their blue guitars and tug on Radiohead’s cape….evoking the forgotten shoegazers like Ride….Chris Martin makes early-’90s nostalgia seem like the next frontier.”

Q (10/01, p.73) – Ranked #21 in Q’s “Best 50 Albums of Q’s Lifetime”

Q (1/01, p.91) – Included in Q’s “50 Best Albums of 2000″ – “…[The] soundtrack to cheap vino-and-fag sessions…”

Alternative Press (12/00, p.94) – 4 out of 5 – “…Shimmering guitars haunt tormented tunes, dark gravel growls vie with Thom Yorke-y high notes….songs dawdle out of either a gentle whisper of sound or an awesome blurge of noise…”

NME (Magazine) (12/30/00, p.77) – Ranked #6 in NME’s “Top 50 Albums Of The Year” – “…Effortlessly moving and hugely popular at the same time…”

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What you see is very much what you get with this Welsh trio. Listening to this album, with its refreshingly uncluttered production, brings frontman Kelly Jones and his two sidekicks into the room with you. Jones sings about everyday topics and emotions in his own inimitable voice, set to outrageously catchy melodies and driven by a strong guitar-based sound.

PERFORMANCE AND COCKTAILS boasts an impressive quota of hit singles, of which “Just Looking,” “Pick a Part That’s New,” and “The Bartender and the Thief” are the best. The album tracks are also extremely fine. Take the closing number, a heartfelt postlude threatening to build on a scale equivalent to “Stairway to Heaven” before ultimately burning itself out. Compared to Stereophonics’ debut, WORD GETS AROUND, this second album presents a more polished, slightly less raw approach. It’s the sound of a band that has made it and is confident in its credentials. This was undoubtedly one of 1999’s most sought-after albums, so go off and join the thousands who’ve already bought it.

Tracklisting
1. Roll Up And Shine
2. Bartender And The Thief
3. Hurry Up And Wait
4. Pick A Part That’s New
5. Just Looking
6. Half The Lies You Tell Me Ain’t True
7. I Wouldn’t Believe Your Radio
8. T Shirt Sun Tan
9. Is Yesterday Tomorrow Today
10. Minute Longer
11. She Take Her Clothes Off
12. Plastic California
13. I Stopped To Fill My Car Up

Professional Reviews
Q (1/00, p.86) – Included in Q Magazine’s “50 Best Albums of 1999.”

Q (12/00, p.151) – 3 stars out of 5 – “…Their shouty power pop certainly does its job….An early Xmas gift for the hardcore fan…”

Following 1995’s DOPES TO INFINITY, which contained the successful single “Negasonic Teenage Warhead”, Monster Magnet is back with a vengeance. POWERTRIP is a phat, funky, heavy, danceable record that assaults the senses. These guys rock, but with a flair and excitement that incorporates some other musical styles as well. Monster Magnet are a metal band for the 90’s–plenty of thunderous riffage, accented by various other elements thrown into the mix.

While POWERTRIP’s first two tracks, “Crop Circle” and the title cut, are straight ahead heavy tunes, “Space Lord” ventures into some funky territory. With an acoustic intro, the track is reminiscent of early Red Hot Chilli Peppers or Mindfunk. “Temple Of Your Dreams” has a great dance groove and “19 Witches” has a Pulp Fictionish surf guitar feel to it. “See You In Hell” is straightforward rock with some keyboards thrown in, while “Tractor” goes the punk route. POWERTRIP, while definitely a heavy album, provides enough different styles to appeal to fans of any of the above mentioned genres. All in all, Monster Magnet goes outside the boundaries of traditional metal to produce a record of groove-laden depth.

Tracklisting
1. Crop Circle
2. Powertrip
3. Space Lord
4. Temple Of Your Dreams
5. Bummer
6. Baby Götterdämerung
7. 19 Witches
8. 3Rd Eye Landslide
9. See You In Hell
10. Tractor
11. Atomic Clock
12. Goliath And The Vampires
13. Your Lies Become You

Professional Reviews
Entertainment Weekly (7/10/98, p.76) – “…Imagine FUN HOUSE-era Stooges on a sci-fi (or psilocybin?) kick. Wyndorf’s lyrics may be absurd comic-book claptrap…but POWERTRIP’s music is monstrously mind-bending.” – Rating: A-

Entertainment Weekly (7/10/98, p.76) – “…Imagine FUN HOUSE-era Stooges on a sci-fi (or psilocybin?) kick. Wyndorf’s lyrics may be absurd comic-book claptrap…but POWERTRIP’s music is monstrously mind-bending.” – Rating: A-

CMJ (1/11/99, pp.7-8) – “…13 tracks of pounding hard rock glory…sounding a battle cry that’s as evil as Black Sabbath, as dirty as the Stooges, and as righteous as the MC5’s ‘Kick Out the Jams.’ A complete juggernaut…”

These guys are from Sweden, but they play straight-up, North American rock & roll in the vein of Grand Funk Railroad, Bachman-Turner Overdrive, the MC5, the Stooges, and Three Dog Night. The Hellacopters aren’t afraid to show the world that rock music is still alive with their added sheer intensity. And the raw power is present with Grande Rock, with not a single hint of alternative rock or ’80s hair metal to be found.

Tracklisting
1. Action de Grâce
2. Alright Already Now
3. Move Right Out of Here
4. Welcome to Hell
5. Electric Index Eel
6. Paul Stanley
7. Devil Stole the Beat from the Lord
8. Dogday Mornings
9. Venus in Force
10. 5 Vs. 7
11. Lonely
12. Renvoyer

Professional Reviews
Rolling Stone (8/5/99, p.67) – 3 1/2 stars (out of 5) – “…like a mid-Seventies issue of ‘Creem’ magazine come to life….by virtue of spirit, riff, and muscle…”

Alternative Press (9/99, p.101) – 3 out of 5 – “…makes rock and roll groove like it was meant to….GRANDE ROCK delivers rock from evil – meaning Satan will have to content himself with ska…”

Magnet (8-9/99, p.76) – “…good ol’ Midwestern-style rock’n'roll….the Hellacopters make a good argument for the preservation of ‘hard rock’ as a respected genre…”

CMJ (6/7/99, p.26) – “…The punchy GRANDE ROCK is a raunchy rock’n'roll extravaganza….slowing their riffs down and trimming some of their frayed edges to power a focused blast of classic rock-inspired roll.”

New Music Monthly (7/99, p.50) – “…[GRANDE ROCK] takes [cues] from proto-punk bands like Mott The Hoople, the New York Dolls, and most obviously KISS….it might be the best underage drinking album of the year….toast the new kings of Swedish rock…”

Guitar Magazine (7/99, p.98) – “…balls-to-the-wall rawk…refreshing and energizing…”

Recognized as one of Young’s (and hence one of rock & roll’s) finest albums, HARVEST put the singer on the mainstream map with the mega-hit “Heart of Gold,” which defined a soft folk-rock style frequently revisited by lesser artists throughout the 1970s. It also features some of his darker compositions, like the entropy-obsessed “Old Man” and the junkie eulogy, “The Needle and the Damage Done,” one of Young’s most haunting and compelling songs.

Deceptively laid-back-sounding country-rock plaints like “Out on the Weekend” and the title cut caress the ear unassumingly, pulling you into the more ominous subtext that is present even in the rollicking “Are You Ready for the Country.” As always, Young has an ear for contrasts, laying down heavy rock (”Alabama”) beside his balladry, and even employing the London Symphony Orchestra on the excellent confessional “A Man Needs a Maid.” Due to back troubles, Young recorded much of this material while wearing a brace, a fact that seems audible in the tension and unease that underlies the friendly, acoustic surface of this superb release.

Tracklisting
1. Out On The Weekend
2. Harvest
3. A Man Needs A Maid
4. Heart Of Gold
5. Are You Ready For The Country
6. Old Man
7. There’s A World
8. Alabama
9. The Needle & The Damage Done
10. Words (Between The Lines Of Age)

Professional Reviews
Rolling Stone (12/11/03, p.114) – Ranked #78 in Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest Albums Of All Time” – “…Americana – steel, guitar, slide guitar, banjo – stripped down and rebuilt with every jagged edge exposed…”

Q (7/00, p.141) – Included in Q’s “The Best Male Angst Albums Of All Time” – “…The showcase for [his] most affecting artistic devices…”

Mojo (Publisher) (11/01, p.150) – “…If he was laid-back at this time it was simply because spinal surgery had made him literally so…”

NME (Magazine) (10/2/93, p.29) – Ranked #60 in NME’s list of the ‘Greatest Albums Of All Time.’

NME (Magazine) (9/18/93, p.19) – Ranked #22 in NME’s list of the ‘Greatest Albums Of The ’70s.’

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Neil Young – Harvest

As the title implies, this is Gene and Dean Ween’s Nashville move. And for those familiar with the duo’s flexible and comedic musical nature: no, they’re not faking the cowboy swagger or shedding counterfeit tears in their beers just for the sake of digging through the one genre their previous records didn’t excavate. Backed by a who’s who of Music City session players, Ween has produced an authentic update of the late-’60s/early-’70s countrypolitan sound–weepy pedal steel, footloose harmonica, boogie piano, the Jordanaires crooning in the background, pristine production, pretty much all the fixins.

But if you’re looking for a collection of cornball breakup songs and half-baked cowboy tales, well, as Judas Priest says, you’ve got another thing coming. Gene and Dean, after all, have their own standards to live up to; and they’ve never above lowering them. So the breakup song (”Piss Up A Rope”) is viciously upbeat; the sinner’s repentance is titled “Help Me Scrape The Mucus Off My Brain”; and even the one serious song, the Lennon-esque “You Were The Fool,” contains the kind of cosmic couplets country fans would normally have to reach pretty far afield (toward, say, Gram Parsons) to find. Such Ween-foolery allows Gene and Dean to have their country, in a most heartfelt way, and eat it too.

Tracklisting
1. I’m Holding You
2. Japanese Cowboy
3. Piss up a Rope
4. I Don’t Wanna Leave You on the Farm
5. Pretty Girl
6. Powder Blue
7. Mister Richard Smoker
8. Help Me Scrape the Mucus off My Brain
9. You Were the Fool
10. Fluffy

Professional Reviews
Spin (8/96, p.103) – Reasonably Good – “…What makes 12 GOLDEN COUNTRY GREATS a decent Ween record is its transposition of real country into the world of post-indie-rock smart-asses…”

Q (9/96, p.124) – 3 Stars – Good – “…mimicking a myriad of country styles and stereotypes while lyrically tipping the stetson towards the stoned yoof of alternative America…”

Alternative Press (10/96, p.108) – “…Not only have Ween gone country, but they’ve done it up right….The results are as perverse as ever, juxtaposing fairly mainstream musical arrangements…with bizarre lyrics and imagery…”

Melody Maker (8/3/96, p.50) – Recommended – “…Bitter, nerdish misogyny was never conveyed with such tender beauty as on this album…”

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With its titanic guitar solos, symphonic suites, and multi-layered melodies, Muse’s fifth album operates under the assumption that bigger is better. This is the very definition of a super-sized album, an album that takes its cues from Queen, its lyrics from science fiction novels, and its delivery from rock opera. It’s also the first time that Muse has truly sounded like Muse, as few bands since Queen have so readily explored the intersection of bombast and extravagance. THE RESISTANCE is most certainly extravagant — there are snatches of classical piano entwined throughout, not to mention bilingual lyrics, concert hall percussion, coronet solos, and song titles like “Exogenesis: Symphony, Pt. 2 (Cross-Pollination)” — but it’s also quite beautiful, capable of moving between prog rock choruses and excerpts from Chopin’s “Nocturne in E Flat Major” within the same song. Presiding over the mix is frontman Matthew Bellamy, a man who seemingly aspires to be both Brian May and Freddie Mercury. He plays guitar, pounds the piano, and composes the album’s orchestral parts, but his strongest asset is his voice, a sky-scraping tenor dripping with so much emotion that it’s almost lewd. He croons, whispers, annunciates, and belts with confidence, a combination that makes him one of England’s most dazzling singers in recent memory. And since a virtual mountain of voices is better than a single voice (remember: bigger is better), Bellamy also multi-tracks himself, creating towering stacks of harmonies during songs like “Resistance,” “Undisclosed Desires,” and the colossal “United States of Eurasia (+Collateral Damage).”

Tracklisting
1. Uprising
2. Resistance
3. Undisclosed Desires
4. United States Of Eurasia (+Collateral Damage)
5. Guiding Light
6. Unnatural Selection
7. Mk Ultra
8. I Belong To You (+Mon Coeur S’ouvre A Ta Voix)
9. Exogenesis : Symphony Part I (Overture)
10. Exogenesis : Symphony Part Ii (Cross Pollination)
11. Exogenesis : Symphony Part Iii (Redemption)

Professional Reviews
Rolling Stone (p.103) – 3 stars out of 5 — “Songs like the industrial-flavored ‘Uprising’ prove again that Muse know how to whip up an almighty roar.”

Entertainment Weekly (p.129) – “The album’s best track, ‘Uprising,’ is a simple slice of glam rock…” — Grade: B

Billboard (p.57) – “The three-part rock symphony ‘Exogenesis’ closes the album, combining elements of piano and the band’s dramatic flair.”

Q (Magazine) (p.102) – 4 stars out of 5 — “[T]heir new adventures in sci-fi hi-fi are, for the most part, hugely impressive. ‘Uprising’ is a brilliantly addictive opener…”