The Left Banke -- Walk Away Renee/ Pretty Ballerina

  The album that put baroque pop on the map, this underrated classic finds itself right in between Pet Sounds and Sgt. Pepper.

New Riders Of The Purple Sage -- The Adventures Of Panama Red

  Originally an offshoot of The Grateful Dead, exploring burnout 70's hippie city-boy country music, usually I like this kind of Americana, but Panama Red is easily forgettable.

The Stranglers -- Black And White

  Holy frig, what a piece of shit ... the worst part is the album starts off strong, but by the time you've made it to the end of the second side, you wish you had ripped your eardrums out.  I don't know what the fuck happened while making the album other than maybe the band had gotten so deep into drugs that when it came time to finish the record they no longer gave a shit and rushed whatever garbage out to get it over with ...

Neil Young -- Time Fades Away

  Although Young is embarrassed of this loose jam sounding live LP, most likely due to the memories of the 90 day bender/tour these tracks were recorded from, other than that, who cares, it has that pre-Brian Jonestown Massacre raw one take sound, and seems to be the missing links from the Harvest album, which to me always sounded too short and unfinished ... so frig off Neil, it's awesome!

Big Star -- Sister Lovers/ Third

  Forget the stereotypical Big Star power popped classic rock numbers, the brilliance of this album lies in the 70s style gothic baroque pop songs, which are so good they are genius!

Desmond Dekker -- Rudy Got Soul

  To me Dekker is the undisputed king of the Jamaican sound with chops comparable to Smokey Robinson and Curtis Mayfield, too bad Desmond faded into obscurity after his initial heyday and the newly popularized reggae music.

Robert Loveless

 

  From what I saw the other night R. Loveless is a synth popped blue eyed soul'd Marvin Gaye, but the cassette has more of a garage rock feel of the same sound, both being just as good as the other, his name seemed fitting 'cause the night in question that I watched him get down and do his thing, there was a girl there, in a very small club, that I had spent an intimate evening with, despite our one night connection we acted like the electricity between us was never there and went on ignoring each other, I felt torturedly destroyed while pretending to have a great time, "Tracks Of My Tears" style ... fuck the world can be such shit sometimes, at least there's good music to save us from our sorrows!

King Tuff -- Black Moon Spell

  The much anticipated and hugely disappointing rock album Black Moon Spell.  After his last killer record I was wondering where King Tuff would go to next, instead of forward he took two steps back, I was initially very pissed when I listened to this garage pop punk piece of crap, but after a few more spins I realized that this release should have been his first album rather than the third ... God, I hope he takes a turn back on the next one and looses all the stereotypical graveyards, drugs and babes bullshit and returns with his Beatles'd melodied garage grunge!!

The Everywheres

  A Galaxie 500'd version of The Brian Jonestown Massacre with the surfiness of The Allah Las.  I was so diggin' their set when I saw them live that I had to buy their album ... which rarely happens!

Best Fiends

  Halifax's answer to Jay Reatard and Jon Spencer.

Walrus -- Glam Returns

  Best damn east coast band since Eric's Trip ... not only do they have a 60's indie space rock sound with a 12 string guitar, like a sort of Byrds Impala, but they've got one the raddest drummer in town, who my buddy and I have named Phil Masters, 'cause his drum fills are out of this world.  I can't wait for their next show, their next release ... or their next anything!