Mini-Reviews

Artist: Debo Band

Album: Debo Band

Debo Band are eleven students and graduates of Boston’s Berklee College of Music — singer, guitar, bass, drums, accordion, two violins, four brass players — whose self-titled debut is my new favorite album of African-styled music, for what that’s worth. My prior favorites were Who is This America? by New York City’s Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra and, I guess, Remain in Light by Talking Heads — as well as, oddly, one album […]

Artist: Winter Sounds

Album: Runner

There’s nothing too unusual about Winter Sounds’ Runner, so I’ll start with comparisons. They tend to be more rousing and uplifting in feel than the bands they resemble most; keep that in mind while mentally relating them to Big Country or For Against or Icicle Works, and you should be fine. Up to and including the ’80s-style big production, and adding the kinds of glistening keyboard sounds that guitar-bass-drums rock groups then […]

Artist: Lost Lander

Album: DRRT

“Alternative orchestral synth rock Portland”, announces Lost Lander’s Bandcamp tags: a fair place to start. Their songs – calm, pretty, elegant, and fond of long, glistening notes – remind me of “laptop-pop” bands like Postal Service and Owl City. But the ways the comparison fails are important too. Matt Sheehy’s voice is deeper and more strained, and Lost Lander are an actual band. Patrick Hughes’s drums thump and pitter-pat and crash and echo; […]