i hate the sound of guitars

It was just about a month ago that I became aware of the self-described “pop music cult” Hussalonia, and since then I’ve listened to Hussalonia songs about 350 times. Even more surprising, I’m showing no signs of getting sick of them.
Partly this is because Hussalonia is really good*, partly it’s because they (mostly just he [...]

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One of the reasons I never turned into a “real” music writer is that sometimes I get stuck, especially when a piece of music really hits me hard. I want to write about it badly, but because I lack clarity and objectivity, it takes a long time to come up with anything worth reading [...]

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You’ve got just about a month left to place an order from Asaurus Records, the micro-indie label that releases beautiful hand-packaged CDRs from the likes of Pants Yell!, Colin Cleary, The Mathletes, and many more. There’s a very generous selection of free tracks to download, too. Among the “I Hate the Sound of Guitars”-endorsed discs [...]

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The first time I saw The Magnetic Fields was such a profoundly moving experience that even after several years, I have trouble distilling a coherent description of what was so magical about it. It was very warm and human, almost disquietingly intimate — perhaps a bit like eavesdropping on the quiet evening gathering of a [...]

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Here are some things that Dean Edward Wells, a.k.a. The Capstan Shafts, doesn’t have:

Fancy recording equipment
A rock-solid sense of timing
Rabid perfectionism about the recording process
Long songs

Here are some things that Dean Edward Wells does have:

A prodigious bounty of catchy melodies and riffs
A bevvy of quirky lyrics set to the former
A pretty good singing voice
A modicum [...]

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I love this band so much that I’m untrustworthy on the subject. Usually I cringe when backing vocals stray out of tune or when tempos drift between instruments. When B for Brontosaurus exhibits these flaws (which they do sometimes, especially live) I make excuses to find it charming, rather than grating. “Their enthusiasm outpaces their [...]

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