Bears And Bullets Albums Of The Year (#10-#1)

Continuing from yesterday, here are the top ten selections for Bears and Bullets Top Albums Of 2012:

Albums of the Month: May 2012

Albums of the Month - May 2012

Without much question, May has been the standout month of 2012 in terms of new music. There have been quite a few masterful releases during the span, including the highly-anticipated Beach House and Sigur Ros albums. But just like last month, the most-expected releases didn't make my final three. Here are my three favorite albums from last month.

3.) Royal Headache (Self-Titled)
It's tough to say there's anything more to Royal Headache's self-titled reissue than conveniently well-packaged, murky garage rock. There's an inherit vagueness that plagues most of the lo-fi structure of the genre, meddling much of the West Sydney punk vocalist known as 'Shogun.' But despite the near-classic muffled choke of vocals, you can get an easy sense that there's more style thrown into the album than what the lo-fi template originally offered. Songs like "Down the Lane" and "Distant and Vague," despite following a fuzz-rush of garage punk tracks, stick to a soulful idea, sounding as eternally sweet as the other songs filter their vigor. The attachment is there, despite only 26 minutes of endurance to the album's more endearing finishers, culminating with "Honey Joy," the most sincere the band has ever sounded.

2.) Japandroids - Celebration Rock

There's a total vibrancy that comes with the exhausting youth that is Japandroids. Two men, Brian King and drummer David Prowse, sound bigger than themselves, parlaying echoed chorus in between energetic crashes, as they had on their previous release Post-Nothing. But with Celebration Rock (Insound), an album that follows much of the same structure (eight tracks, youthful sentiments), everything begins to resonate a little more. The fury is more clear, the emotions more bright and earnest. But what made Japandroids so profound in 2009 is the same in 2012; unhinged, accessible, and flourishing with potential.

1.) El-P - Cancer For Cure
It's not simply the verses for EL-P (Jaime Meline) that do him justice anymore, or since his last studio album, 2007's I'll Sleep When You're Dead. There's a chasm of industrial technique behind his Brooklyn-centric diatribes, not merely settling for dead-end typical hip-hop production. With the album's first half, culminating with all-star standout "Tougher Colder Killer" featuring Killer Mike and Despot, Cancer For Cure (Insound) kills as much with eye-popping verses as it does with claustrophobic metal beats. There's so much packed together within the first six tracks, that if it had stopped it there it would almost seem acceptable. But the songs continue to trek with sophistication unreal to the rest of modern hip-hop, spilling mind-out-of-matter lines from the alter egos that we, and El-P, understand.

Royal Headache video - Girls

If you haven't checked out Royal Headache's self-titled debut (out now via What's Your Rupture? records), do yourself the service. But until then, check out the band's first video for "Girls," directed by guitarist Lawrence Hall.

Tuesday Bears: Royal Headache, and trying new things

I'm feeling a sense of guilt. Outside of Bears and Bullets Our Newest Obsession series, I'm not allocating much material from artists that don't already have the internet buzz at their back. Sure, every once in a while I give credence to something that surely could use some more, but for the most part I play it safe, posting music videos and performances far more than anything else. And sure, it's easy, but it doesn't move this anywhere.

That's not to say that I won't still be posting the regular things, but Bears and Bullets should be more about the new, unheard. Call it a change of heart, or whatever, but I can't keep doing things the same way. It has to grow.

So, listen to these new songs from Royal Headache, I band I know almost nothing about. You can listen below and download the MP3 versions of "Eloise" and "Down the Lane" over at Rollo & Grady.

Royal Headache - Eloise by Bears and Bullets

Royal Headache - Down the Lane by Bears and Bullets