Everybody Is Running Away From Hell

Mary Timony “Friend To J.C.” – I haven’t heard all of her forthcoming album, but it seems as though Mary Timony’s Rennaisance Faire period has run its course, which I think will be good news for many of her longterm fans. To be fair, Mary wrote a lot of great material during that period, but it is pretty clear to me that the ideas were yielding diminishing returns – The Magic City > Mountains >>> Golden Dove. “Friend To J.C.” sounds more like Helium than anything else she has recorded during her solo career, mainly because the emphasis has been placed so heavily on the guitars. It doesn’t feel like a retread or a retreat, but rather the culmination of over a decade of songwriting. (Click here to visit the official Mary Timony website.)

Dälek “Eyes To Form Shadows” – I would be happy enough to hear this song’s distorted electronic textures in an industrial or noise rock song, but I’m thrilled to have them in a hip hop track. It’s only sensible – why NOT rap over loud drones? On one hand, it’s a shame that the only people who are likely to be interested in this stuff are preexisting fans of art rock and underground hip hop, but on the other, why shouldn’t there be hip hop made specifically for that audience? Hip hop has certainly come to the point where it’s so huge that it transcends its cultural origins, so why not have hip hop that swallows up every other conceivable genre? (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)