Either you’re done (lucky you), halfway through (like myself), or not even there yet (God have mercy on your soul)— midterms are here, kids! So instead of sitting in the library and wishing for this hell to be over, here’s three bands, and three of their songs, to put a smile on your face when you’re poring over those dry textbooks.
Ruby The Hatchet
Led Zeppelin swagger, meaty Jefferson Airplane styled male-female vocals, and enough reverb and dirt to make The Black Keys look like one-half of a barbershop quartet, Philadelphia’s Ruby The Hatchet is in the teeth-cutting area of its success. Just in the throes of coming up, adding a unique element to the psychedelic revival that bands like The Black Angels are leading.
Have a paper to crank through? Fire up RTH’s “The Lean” and dig in, as the heavy, chromatic guitar line that opens the song is more than enough to get your blood moving.
Cymbals Eat Guitars
With fuzz driven guitars and flanger effects, this isn’t a Dinosaur Jr. re-imagining, as the soaring vocals lines and interspersed noise-pop cues of the Big Apple’s Cymbals Eat Guitars sophomore effort Lenses Alien is bound to display.
Joseph D’Agostino’s barking, imagery-laden lines are delivered in a fashion similar to early Walkmen songs, lending a bit of a reminiscent feel to those familiar with this genre.
“Keep Me Waiting” is a prime cut off Lenses Alien, with big vocals, big instrumentation, and an even bigger sense of imagination.
No Joy
If Best Coast took one part Nirvana fashion cues, one part psychedelic drugs, and then faced a nuclear holocaust, you’d have No Joy’s ambling, trance-inducing sound. Out of Montreal, Canada, this noise-pop outfit builds upon the shoegaze era with the head-bobbing aplomb that characterizes both their live act and their most recent album, 2010’s Ghost Blonde. Fronted by Laura Lloyd, No Joy accentuates their shows with a lack of audience interaction, with Laura swaying and crooning a lot like J. Mascis circa 1992 — if J. Mascis was blond, female and hot.
Check out “Maggie Says I Love You,” off Ghost Blonde, to get a taste of what No Joy’s all about.
