Score: 8/10 . The Rats come from Norfolk, Virginia, which is a medium-sized city on the Atlantic Coast. But ultimately, they’re in their own world. Believe you me. He**, they have to be. Over and over, the lyrical themes on this concise, Clash/Rancid influenced punk album are lurid, rearing their ugly heads in the form […]

Score: 7.5/10 . Oh Raconteurs, what would we all do if you weren’t overly verbose, obtuse and melodramatic? It just wouldn’t work. It would be like a flavor of Pepsi that doesn’t rot your teeth. Sure enough, “Bored and Razed” chimes like the work of somebody who’s very BORED, the type that would spinily lash […]

Score: 9.5/10 . Haha ok I lied: I’m not done posting yet in this tumultuous midsummer period. Well anyway this is the last thing I expected to see: a new Collective Soul album, a full LP, dropped out of nowhere with no hype, no prior “singles” and very little social media promo (though there thankfully […]

Score: 7/10 . I think maybe I’m losing it because something keeps pulling me back to these Sub Pop releases. Well, they are on a quest for “world domination,” as they’ve stated, and even though in recent years they’ve lost some big-name indie acts like Fleet Foxes and No Age, and put out a really […]

Score: 3/10 . Boy, I still remember when Black Mountain could do no wrong. It was the throes of last decade’s reaction to the war in Iraq, when as they astutely pointed out “The war machine / It keeps on turning”, and in contrast to the sort of androgynous, flaccid indie groups that crowded the […]

Score: 5/10 . You know what’s funny? Just as I was in the midst of what seemed like the umpteenth track of Cate Le Bon’s vapid, desultory voice absently oozing out some more sterile, politically correct chamber pop that sounds like it was made to be listened to on expensive, candy-colored vinyl, I thought of […]

Score: 9.5/10 . Fine, Flying Lotus, I guess you’re KIND of a big deal here at Dolby Disaster, a couple days out of the week. Oh, I named my contact email after you. How’d that get there? Ok saying that the first hip-hop guest appearance singlehandledly precludes this effort from a perfect rating may be a […]

Score: 8/10 . I just noticed something interesting about The National when I looked at their Wikipedia page today: the band is actually composed of two sets of brothers, the siblings Dessner and the siblings Devendorf. Lead singer Matt Berninger also has a brother whom he apparently invited into his home as recently as a […]

Score: 8.5/10 . According to Discogs, It Wasn’t Even Close, the work of Brooklyn rapper Your Old Droog, was produced by Sadhugold, who hails from Philly and “has a thing for high-pitched frequencies.” One reason why It Wasn’t Even Close works is that it SOUNDS tired, the way any work in hip-hop should, given the […]

Score: 8.5/10 . Emerald Valley is the second album from Filthy Friends, a supergroup of sorts which features Sleater-Kinney’s primary lead singer Corin Tucker and R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck, among others. When I googled just “emerald valley,” I ended up with a couple results denoting some ranch or something in Colorado and then this album, […]