ELLIOTT, FALSE CATHEDRALS (REVELATION RECORDS): Haunting, crashing, beautiful, sad, gut-wrenchingly emo-riffic stuff with a cool pulsing beat and some keys. The publicist said, “Go listen to it and cry,” but I made it all the way to track five without breaking down, so joke's on her. Ha!
THE YO-YO'S, UPPERS AND DOWNERS (SUB POP): Good, kinetic, burly, retro-pop rock with an OC sound, which is funny because they're from . . . they're from, well, somewhere else. It might be somewhere far away. I'd tell you, if I could only find their bio. . . .
CAPITOL EYE, MOOD SWINGZ (77 RECORDS): The guitarist's name is Sauce, which makes me want to make fun of him, but that's because I'm a horrible person who's being held hostage by a monstrous pile of mail. Capitol Eye play Limp Bizkit/Cypress Hill-style hip-hop/ metal/rap/rock. Good getting-amped-to-clean-your-desk music, and really, it's so hard to find good desk-cleaning music these days.
THE VANDALS, LOOK WHAT I ALMOST STEPPED IN(NITRO RECORDS): Did you know that Vandals singer Dave Quackenbush is not the son of former state Insurance Commissioner Chuck Quackenbush? It's true! Not his son! If you interview Dave, you will gain no insight into Chuck Quackenbush. So you probably shouldn't ask him about his dad and how he feels about the scandal surrounding his dad because—hello!—it's not his dad.
PEACH, GIVING BIRTH TO A STONE (VILE BEAT): There was this great Seattle band about five years ago called Peach. This isn't them. But this Peach is good too, and it features Justin Chancellor of Tool, and the album artwork is by Adam Jones of Tool, and Peach will be supported on Tool's official website and it's like, hey, how does Peach's butt taste, Tool? But really, this CD is good and dark and swirly and sinewy and kind of like, oh, say—Tool. But more melodic. It's like that, but if instead of Maynard's tortured vocals, there was some English guy singing with a Phantom of the Opera thing going on. In a good way.
EMILIANA TORRINI, LOVE IN THE TIME OF SCIENCE(VIRGIN): Captivating, trancey, chanteuse stuff here, in the vein of Bjrk and Portishead, from a 23-year-old Icelandic/Italian beauty. Uh oh—what's going on here? Am I unwittingly regurgitating press releases? “Italian/Icelandic beauty?” Who writes that? Still, this album deserves repeated spins even if it ultimately gets played at Express, which is where all good, foreign-sounding, trancey, chanteuse stuff goes to die. Cool your jets though, Skipper—the album won't be released until November.
