Latest Review: Magic Lantern - High Beams

Long Beach’s Magic Lantern have finally gone and released a new sonic document after what seemed like an eternity of waiting. Eagerly anticipated by those who have been biding their time waiting for the band to get on with their uber limited cassette only and CD-R releases (their Self-Titled CD-R was limited to 30), “High Beams”, the band’s latest opus [...]

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club Baby 81 preview…kinda

Really I don’t know what it is about Black Rebel Motorcycle Club that instills so much hate towards them. Is that they came of age in so called “New Rock Revolution” amid the ranks of The Strokes and Kings of Leon, or maybe it’s that 2/3rds of this band so desperately wish they were British (drummer Nick Jago actually is), or maybe it’s their utter disregard stick to one genre-label-style of music. Or maybe it’s just that their name is so god damn cool it just puts people off, I mean, don’t you wish your band had a cool name like that instead of something with a “The” in front of it. And if you didn’t know, their name is taken from Marlon Brando’s motorcycle gang in The Wild One, which actually might be another contributing factor, due to the light that Brando is held in.

So BRMC’s new album, Baby 81, hits store shelves in a couple weeks and unless you’ve already downloaded a leaked copy, your notions of the new album have been limited to the streaming samples of the album’s single, “Weapon of Choice”, and “666 Conducer” on the band’s website. That is until now. RCA have posted a medley of 30sec clips of each track, and even though this isn’t as good as giving away a couple of tracks, it does give you a pretty good idea of what Baby 81 sounds like.

Baby 81 album preview (mp3) and track listing.

[audio:http://a314.g.akamai.net/7/314/26062/v001/bmgdv.download.akamai.com/3080/production/HTTP/RCA/10/561/BRMC_Baby_81.MP3]

With Baby 81, the hand claps and foot stomps that filled 2005’s Howl, a mostly acoustic release, are gone. What’s left is the prior album’s roots rock aesthetic combined with BRMC’s initial shoegaze offerings from their first two albums, Take Them On, On Your Own and their self-titled debut. Also on hand on their new release are some soaring “Brit rock” epics that lend themselves to The Charlatans, The Verve, and Oasis.

Also, I want to note that out of all their recordings, on Baby 81, this is the best that the bass and drums have ever sounded.

BRMC play Los Angeles at The Wiltern on May 8th with that annoying iTunes commerical band, The Fratellis and the hit then rest of the country with the even more annoying-cringe inducing-Hot Topic whoring-stole your sister’s make up-band, The Horrors.

Baby 81 in stores May 1st: buy it at insound! | download it from iTunes | download it from emusic