The Apples in Stereo - Velocity of Sound
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Free Music Notes for Velocity of Sound
Free Music Review: The sound of fluff
Hit: 3 Stars
"Velocity of Sound" might be the Apples' most featherlight production to date, so it's a bit of a surprise that this one owes the least to the bouncy and acidic 60s sound they've aped so often and so well. "That's Something I Do" is actually more mid-90s mall punk than 60s psychedelic pop; the vocalizing on `Do You Understand?" made me think of They Might Be Giants; "I Want" closes on the same riff as the Strokes' "Take It or Leave It." Even "She's Telling Lies," which has an obvious Brian Wilson/Beach Boys hook to it, sounds more of the early 90s surf brigade than the ones that used to sing of hotrods and malt shop girls.
It's not the riffs and volume that makes it so fluffy (they've always been melodic, and the guitars are tuned for fuzzy feedback) but the lack of memorable moments. There really aren't any bad songs on here, but this is more Weezer-lite than Beatles (though still better than what Weezer has become now). As it stands, "Velocity" will turn very few heads, but there's so little to honestly complain about, that it becomes one of the great bottom stack records of all time (bottom stack record: the album you always have out and ready to play, but never anything more than a backup at the bottom of the stack).
Best cuts: "Better Days," "Rainfall," "Please," "I Want," "Baroque," "That's Something I Do," "She's Telling Lies"
Free Music Review: Different, punky, happy, and fun
Hit: 4 Stars
Don't buy this album expecting to hear the clear guitar hooks of "Tin Pan Alley" or the goofy and nasal voices of "Go" and "The Bird that You Can't See."
But do buy this album.
This is The Apples in Stereo as a power-pop-punk outfit with countless catchy hooks, happy lyrics, but with everything swirling in a churning wave of fuzz and distortion. Fun and fast punk guitar, a great mix of various male and female vocals, the feels of 1950s radio ditties and 1960s surf rags and 1970s punk and 1990s crunch.... It's all here, and you will enjoy it, whether you're an Apples in Stereo fan or whether you've never heard them before but just like to rock out and feel good. Check it out.
Free Music Review: Man, This Sucks...
Hit: 5 Stars
Dude, what is this man? It's like, all happy and stuff. That's crap man. I'll admit, these guys used to kinda catchy, but now they sound like the Beach Boys molested by the Jesus And Mary Chains' Psychocandy. I mean, those guitars! They don't even do anything except play some chords again and again. And it keeps going and going. I mean, alright, I guess if you danced to it would be kinda fun. But real music is about feeling. There aren't any feelings on this record. It makes me all smiley, and I really don't like being smiley. There's so much pain out there, how can you just ignore it? Velocity Of Sound? I don't get it. It's too simple, it's too jolly, the lyrics don't mean anything. Okay, I'm done. Now where's that Ramones record...Free Music Review: Rotten apples
Hit: 1 Stars
Before we get started here, I have a guilty confession: I like pop music. The really bouncy kind, the kind that's so sugary it could rot teeth. Or, to use another metaphor, music that sounds like someone stuffing prozac in your ears.As such, it was love at first listen the first time I heard the Apples in Stereo. On earlier albums, I pictured Robert Schneider (the lead singer and primary songwriter) as something like Brian Wilson's hyperactive kid brother, compensating for his lack of musical or lyical depth and his tendency toward repetition with a boundless energy and optimism. And while I'm not placing, say, "Tone Soul Evolution" up there next to "Pet Sounds", I loved it.
So like the mindless consumer I am, "Velocity of Sound" came out and I skipped all the way to the record store and slapped my $15 or so on the counter without hearing a single track, popped the CD in my CD player and cried all the way home.
Okay, that's an exaggeration. But not by much. I know they couldn't be shiny and happy forever, and it's good that they tried to climb out of the musical niche they had carved for themselves. But I've listened to it ten times, in good moods and bad, and I just can't force myself to like it. Change is good, but changing into a generic clone of The Strokes is bad, and that's what they did. They added a distorted guitar or so and tried to sing/shout over it (I'll admit here that the resulting vocals are occasionally less abrasive than the nasally ones we've come to know and tolerate), and decided that if they couldn't have good lyrics, they'd have lyrics that were harder to understand. In this confusion, they lost their melodies, which before were the selling point of their songs, leaving the bouncy listener humming it under her breath all day. What remains just sounds kind of tone-deaf.
Given the recent "returning to the roots of rock" movement (whatever the name for it is I'm sure it's equally stupid), I can't help but feel like the Apples are attempting to gain a bigger fan base by riding in the wake of The Stokes/Hives/Vines. The result is something that manages to completely miss both the original Apples sound and the sound of the bands they seek to imitate. Here's hoping the next time they try to expand their style, they do it in a way that's a little more true to them.
Free Music Review: Welcome back Mitch!
Hit: 5 Stars
Well, we`ve waited 15 years for the next Let`s Active / Mitch Easter record---and here it is!! It was well worth the wait. FABULOUS!! Welcome back Mitch!