There was a time when lo-fi wasn’t a choice. Artists either had the money for a proper studio recording or they didn’t, and if they self-recorded on the cheap those shortcuts were bound to show. These days, of course, it doesn’t take a whole lot of money to achieve a decent amount of polish, so it’s not unreasonable to hold “lo-fi” recordings to a higher standard. Sundog, the latest EP by Milwaukee artist defkid, is one of the few recordings I’ve heard this summer that justifies its busted aesthetic. It’s a jumble of blurry, boozy slacker-folk that plays like an old cassette tangled in the tape deck of an early-’90s Toyota Camry. It’s just five songs long, and all are worth your while, but if you’re in a rush start with “Alkali Blues,” which splits the difference between Lou Barlow’s Sentridoh-era strummings and Neutral Milk Hotel’s eyed-eyed warble-pop.
Nobody likes a showoff, which is probably why piano-based singer-songwriters aren’t especially popular these days. Life is just too short to spend listening to Ben Folds types ham their way through glorified show tunes. But occasionally somebody comes along and does something truly clever with the form. Enter Max Devereaux, a multi-instrumentalist songwriter whose lavish pop songs are showy but never too showy, arty but never too arty. He’s also prolific as hell. He’s been flooding his Bandcamp page with new songs, and the ones contained on his new album Singing Another Song are some of his best yet. Recommended if you like Jens Lekman, or if you don’t hate Randy Newman.
I miss drum and bass. The style has fallen out of vogue over the last few years, in part due to poor market positioning: It’s too heavy for the cerebral set, not heavy enough for the dubstep set. So it’s nice to hear Milwaukee producer Taylor dabble in the form on his new Psychosis EP, even if he’s only moonlighting. This stuff will never not sound good to me.
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Awkward Terrible's new EP is just two songs clocking five and a half minutes, but damn if they don’t make them count. Where similar chiptune bands sometimes lean too hard on the video-game sounds gimmick, here the Milwaukee trio clears plenty of room for the guitars, which slash and flail magnificently. Maybe it’s time for another full-on dance-punk revival?
This spring ex-Young Holidays lead Max Holiday released his first single as Bleach Athletixx, “California Future,” an ungodly catchy pop tune washed over by ’80s synths. He’s back with another sun-baked power-pop nugget: “Squatter’s Rights.” This one leaves the synths behind in favor of the proven combo of crunchy guitars and big drums. There’s more to come; Holiday says he’s readying more singles (or possibly an EP) for release in the next few weeks.
I’m always amazed by the sheer quantity of young talent in Milwaukee’s rap scene, and that goes for all corners of the scene, including the more alternative-leaning ones. One of the new guys worth keeping an eye on is Slang the Troubadour, whose emotionally frenzied delivery recalls the late, great Minneapolis rapper Eyedea. He released his first video, “My Findings,” last month. “Must've worked on this for about 6 months,” he writes of the video, which he filmed around the Miramar Theatre and Milwaukee Art Museum, “with the help of my cinematographer Josh Peterson and a lot of local rappers who were featured as extras.”
Meanwhile, on the other side of the Hoan Bridge, the folk-rock group Twin Brother filmed their live video for “Fire Fire Fire” at their regular haunt Club Garibaldi. It’s a tease from their upcoming live album, due Aug. 3, and it’s absolutely beautiful.
