Review(s): Sweet 75, Three O'clock, American Nightmare, Metric x2

Sweet 75 - Sweet 75: Krist Novoselic's first post-Nirvana band is forgettable. So forgettable that I listened to this disc over two weeks ago and forgot about.

Three O'Clock - Sixteen Tambourines/Baroque Hoedown: Their impact and influence on the Stone Roses is apparent, but the repetitive nature of the songs leaves more to be desired.

American Nightmare/Give Up The Ghost - We're Down 'till We're Underground: Poor production permeates this past due disc.

Metric - Static Anonymity: Exhibit A: Band trying too hard.

Metric - Old World Underground, Where Are You?: Wait, I thought I took Static Anonymity out of the CD player.

Review(s): Jay-Z, The Swords Project x2

Jay-Z - The Black Album: The final maturation of Hip-Hop. Now, if someone would just do something to move the genre forward, I'd appreciate it.

The Swords Project - The Swords Project: The American Sigur Ros. (note: this is a good thing)

The Swords Project - Entertainment Is Over If You Want It: Every once in a while, a CD comes along that renews my faith in something. In this case, Entertainment Is Over If You Want It renews my faith in the Post-Rock genre. Breathtaking, stunning, engaging, this discs make me re-evaluate my Top 11 of 2003 (in addition to Broken Social Scene)

Review(s): Beau Sia, The Books, Bark Pyschosis, Badfinger, Aerial M

Beau Sia: Attack! Attack! Go! Go!: In what seems like a logical step, Beau Sia tries to attach his in-your-face style of 'def poetry' to some music (beats). This works under the pretenses that you like Beau Sia's poetry (I do) and understand that the music is only there to drive to poem on (which, I do).

The Books - The Lemon Of Pink: The most cohesive album of incoherent fragments that I've ever heard.

Bark Psychosis - Hex: Simply beautiful.

Badfinger - The Very Best Of Badfinger: As if you needed another reason as to why '60s Pop/Rock is infinitely better than modern Pop/Rock.

Aerial M - As Performed By: Aerial M is Dave Pajo. Dave Pajo is Slint. Slint is Post-Rock. Aerial M is Post-Rock, but still bad.

Review(s): Anadivine, Exhaust x2, Echo and the Bunnymen

Anadivine - Anadivine: I always knew the Coheed and Cambriazation of 'emo' was an inevitablilty. I didn't know, however, just how mediocre the results would be.

Exhaust - Enregistreur: Boring.

Exhaust - Exhaust: The most engaging post-rock album I've heard in a long time from non-heavyweights (GY!BE, ASMZ, EITS, etc).

Echo And The Bunnymen: Crystal Days: 1979-1999: Reviewing a four-disc career overview of an artist whose work you are not familiar with is rather daunting. However, I shall trudge forward. Sounding like any numer of UK bands (Joy Division, Stone Roses, Happy Mondays) during their quest for the original sound, they fail to stand out. That being said, when they are on top of their game (songs like The Killing Moon and Lips Like Sugar) they are nothing more than Echo and the Bunnymen, and this, my friend, is a very good thing. Their works are meant to be listened to as individual albums, and this collection is only for hardcore fans as it contains a wonderful set of live numbers (including a string of covers - Beatles, Dylan, Rolling Stones) and alternate versions of included songs. I recommend you at least check out this band, but perhaps not this collection. I, myself, will be on the lookout for their proper albums (specifically, Crocodiles and Ocean Rain both of which tthe Bible gives 4.5 stars (out of 5))

Review(s): The Unicorns

The Unicorns - Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone?: A friend of mine, on the subject of The Unicorns had only this to say: "they're weird", which, as you might have guessed, stuck with me as I listened to this CD. Weird as it is, the last three tracks (and perhaps more, as I listened to the first 9 tracks and the last 3 tracks on two separate occassions with two different sets of circumstances) had some [2nd ed] very [ed.] strong redeeming factors.

Review(s): Esmerine, Low

Esmerine - If Only A Sweet Surrender To The Nights To Come Be True: Same post-rock formula with different instrumentation yields similar results. A wonderfully talented group of individuals with boring music [on its own merit] that would be perfect for a movie.

Low - Christmas: It's amazing what words and a singer can do for post-rock. It's also amazing how emotional a sub-5 minute song can be (take the hint GY!BE et al).