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• June 3, 2009
• Reviews

06/03/09

The Tough Alliance—A New Chance

Au Revoir Simone—Still Night, Still Light The lovely ladies of ARS are back with their strongest record yet. The formula is still the same: sweet songs with 3 part harmonies, 3 keyboards, and a drum machine. What we like so much about this band is how they can get so much emotion out of very simple machines. Casios never sounded so good.

The Tough Alliance—A New Chance So what if this album came out nearly two years ago. We never really gave it a fair chance then but it's been consistently next to our CD player for close to a year now. Yet another Swedish pop concoction, this band is probably the most contagious thing you could ever listen to. Take, for instance, the first song "Something Special." It sounds like Wham! doing a dancehall reggae song--the whole thing is crazy but it works. Highly recommended.

Cold Cave—Cremations This Philadelphia group has been creeping up on our radar for a little while now. We keep trying to buy their records before finding out that they are absurdly rare and out-of-print. This CD brings together some of their early records to give you a picture of the band: dark synth-led new wave made on homemade-sounding synthesizers. Bonus info: if you can track down their previous record, "The Trees Grew Emotions and Died," check it out. The title track may be the best single of the millennium.

So what if this album came out nearly two years ago. We never really gave it a fair chance then but it's been consistently next to our CD player for close to a year now...