Author Archives: Ross Rinehart

Last month, an impassioned Animal Collective fan hacked into band member Brian “Geologist” Weitz’s e-mail account and, posing as Geologist, sent out a message pleading for fans to leak “Merriweather Post Pavilion” ““ less than a month before its vinyl and digital release date.

As youthful ebullience often knows no bounds, Cardiff’s indie-pop wunderkinds Los Campesinos! offer “We are Beautiful, We are Doomed” a mere eight months after their debut album “Hold On Now, Youngster …” cemented their status as this year’s premier, precociously erudite band. The new record comes so quickly on the heels of the debut that the young U.K. band appears to release its sophomore slump even before passing freshman year.

Brookyln duo High Places’ name may conjure images of grandeur and splendor.

Album artwork is rarely as appropriate and evocative as the image that graces the sleeve of the vampy, electro-pop outfit of Of Montreal’s ninth studio album, “Skeletal Lamping.”

It’s hardly a secret that the music industry is struggling.

Seemingly shot out of the Internet hype machine’s well-oiled cannon, Black Kids, from Jacksonville, Fla., cycled through the stages of blog excitement ““ critical praise and immediate backlash ““ late last year before the band could hook a record deal, tour the greater U.S. or even release a physical product of any kind.

In June 2005, Jason Pierce, the main visionary behind Spiritualized’s orchestral drug rock, was rushed to Royal London Hospital, where he was diagnosed with bilateral pneumonia and experienced a near brush with his longtime lyrical preoccupation: death.