Review: Tokyo Police Club – TPC

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TPC

On TPC, the self-titled and fourth full-length LP from Tokyo Police Club, they crank up the guitars and hone in on their songwriting. Coming off of two quick EPs, entitled Melon Collie and the Infinite Radness (Part I and II), after the success of my favorite effort to date by the band, Forcefield, Tokyo Police Club wanted to reinvent themselves once again. What we are left with is a solid mix of guitar-driven rock by a band still trying to figure out who they are.

Starting off the 12-song set is the track called “New Blues,” that reminded me a bit of the garage-rock style of The Strokes with Dave Monks trademark earnest vocal delivery. When Monks sings, “Battle cry, I can barely sleep/It happens every single time/It’s in my heart/It’s in my soul/For once I don’t want it to be denied,” you can feel every heartbeat and drop of emotion that went into the song. It also doesn’t hurt to have a very talented guitarist backing Monks’ words in Josh Hook, who certainly lives up to his last name by crafting several key hooks in many of the memorable songs found on this album.

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Avril Lavigne Talks With Billboard

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Avril Lavigne sat down to talk with Billboard:

After cranking her cover of favorite Nickelback song “How You Remind Me,” Lavigne searches YouTube for her and Whibley’s performance of Sum 41’s “In Too Deep.” “What a great song, right?” asks Lavigne. (I have to admit, it is.) She joins her 23-year-old self in harmonizing: “’Cause I’m in too deep, and I’m trying to keep/Up above in my head, instead of going under.”

Review: Belly – IMMIGRANT

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Belly - Immigrant

Belly is a Canadian rapper with Palestinian-Jordanian ancestry. Hoping to escape violence and poverty, his family immigrated to Ottawa, Canada when he was a boy. It was during this phase of his life that he learned how to sell drugs, and live with the challenges of being a Muslim in a primarily non-Muslim country. On IMMIGRANT, Belly tells this story with the help of some top-rated producers, such as TRAKGIRL, Ben Billions, Metroboomin, and Southside who deliver the catchy beats as he captivates listeners with his thought-provoking lyrics.

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Anberlin Announce New Show

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Anberlin have announced a show with Underoath in December. Their website has also been updated.

I’m honestly shocked. I remember reading this and everything else the band said when they did their final tour, and thinking they’d be one of the bands to never come back:

Honestly, we as Anberlin will never play another show. It would have to be such grandiose circumstances to change that, somebody sick, or something that’s just overwhelming that we couldn’t say no to. But I think it would take away from the legacy that we built, or tried to build anyway, as Anberlin, and I think it would take away from these shows if we were like “2018 we’re going to do a reunion!”

I think it’s kinda funny in hindsight that he mentioned 2018 specifically. Still, bring on more Anberlin! Guess it’s time to break out that discography again.

Update: Here’s a quote from the Underoath press release about this show:

“We’ve been playing shows in the Tampa area with Anberlin since we were basically kids,” Underoath said.”We knew them coming back to play this hometown show with us was a big ask — but it just felt right. We have said we couldn’t be more pumped to close out the ‘Erase Me’ tour with this show in our hometown. But we’ve been proven wrong.”

“All the Anberlin dudes reconnected over this last year, hung on the beach together, and then, when we got asked to play this show with Underoath, in our hometown, the answer was ‘yeah!,'” said Anberlin drummer Nathan Young. “I mean why wouldn’t we do that? Life is short and we should almost always say ‘yes’ to rad stuff. Plus, we’ve been homies with Underoath for 15-plus years. [Guitarist] Tim [McTague] is my brother-in-law and we’ve never played a proper show together. It’s just way overdue.”

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How Playing Music Benefits Your Life

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Mike Duffy, writing at Fender:

The research found that the guitar players of today are more diverse than ever before. Women continue to define the emerging guitar market, accounting for 50 percent of all beginner and aspirational players – begging the question, is the future of guitar female? The growing diversity of players expands beyond gender, as well. Both African-American and Hispanic consumers now represent a significant and growing share of new players: African-Americans account for 19 percent of aspirational players, while Latin players make up 25 percent of beginners.

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