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In the summer of 1998 ? brought together by a slew of disparate-yet-alluring musical reference points ? high school friends Eddie Baranek (vocals/guitar), Mike Trombley (drums), and Mark Leahey (bass/vocals) formed The Sights. The trio began playing around their hometown of Detroit shortly thereafter, around which time Trombley, founding drummer, headed to California for what would come to be a three-year respite from the band and also the impetus for a revolving door of drummers, bassist and keyboard players. Undaunted , The Sights took to the studio and began recording their debut album, Are You Green?, at Jim Diamond?s Ghetto Recorders in Detroit . Originally released in June of 1999, Are You Green? was picked up by L.A.-based Fall of Rome Records and re-released the following year. Never big on rest, The Sights went to work on their sophomore album, Got What We Want (released in 2002). With this, the band?s freakishly precocious ability to blend frenetic garage rock, Motown and 60?s pop into something equal parts classic and catchy got them noticed. Got What We Want was released in the U.K. a year later, garnering them some very nice words from both the British press ("Got What We Want is a revelation - a treasure trove of sparky and wildly immediate songwriting." --NME) and the not-so British press ("At last - a new Detroit-garage band that comes in colors." --Rolling Stone). The Sights hit the road for a year of touring both countries, including a 10-week stint sleeping inside the group?s 1991 Ford Econoline van and stealing bagels for sustenance. In the spring of 2004, The Sights - now including relative newbie Bobby Emmett as organist/bassist and Keith Fox as drummer- caught the ear of ex-Smashing Pumpkins guitarist James Iha, who signed them to his own Scratchie Records ( an imprint of New Line Records). And with that, the band headed back to Ghetto Recorders to record their self-titled third LP, The Sights, due out in April 2005. No small feat, the album combines the unobtrusive honesty of The Band with slivers of influence from The Sights? own personal record collections: Ike & Tina, Solomon Burke, Everly Brothers , Bob Seger, Tim Hardin and all manner of raucous songwriting. The end result is an album that?s classic, not derivative?filled with swagger and deference?and ridiculously catchy. Really.
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Fresh from the U.K cult success of their debut single 'Gravity's Rainbow' earlier this year, Klaxons (that's Jamie, Simon and James to their local Vicar) are now venturing Stateside with their offerings of post punk sensibilities with their deep love of Rave music described by Jaime as the most short lived genre of all time. It never even existed and classic Pop culture that sticks like knives out of their every chord change. Resulting in an instant mind bending, shoe stomping hit hailed as The most worthy indie dancefloor filler of the year NME Touching down in 2006 from a place undetermined to wrestle the hearts and minds of the nations music lovers from last year's seemingly all-pervading po-faced, post-punk moroseness. The band describes their sound as Josef K-meets-Baby D, with a twinkle in their eye, surely the first to mention those names in the same sentence. American audiences will immediately see the nod towards influential 90's bands such as Happy Mondays and Altern8. Definitions aside, what you hear is post punk psychedelic pop that meets pill popping dance music and it sure works. A trio with heads jam packed with ideas, ideas that layer influences and an imagination with genuine talent. Dazed & Confused Xan Valleys E.P lurches out demonically from a world of distortion and drummatic? madness, stuffing the peaks and breakdowns into moments of a sheer pop meltdown. If ever a band were all about the moment, all about Myspace as a progression of rave cultures underground communication, and all about creating a live experience every bit as exhilarating as their singles, this is the Klaxons signature sound. The opening track Gravity's Rainbow doesn't mess around as it welcomes and steers the listener into an eerie world of pumping psychedelia combined with melodic and romantic vocals blissfully taking you on a pleasantly trippy ride through their wondrous world and another dimension that is Xan Valleys. One listen to Atlantis To Interzone and the several miles of dots between those influences are quickly joined, where screaming sirens and samples straight out of a field in '89 give way to the punked out half-falsetto, half melodic breakneck vocals and drums. Klaxon, a French verb meaning to too certainly alludes to the raving mania of their audiences who frantically get down to the sounds with horns and whistles intact. But also the word's origin is actually a form of tribal drumming, Simon says used to communicate over long distances, pre amplification and telephones. Therefore, these London lads really are practicing the art of channelling a much loved yet equally forgotten musical era now reinvented and given back to us in the form of Klaxons.
One of the cornerstone punk bands of the '90s, Rancid's unabashedly classicist sound drew heavily from the Clash's early records, echoing their left-leaning politics and fascination with ska, while adding a dash of essential hardcore crunch. Critics praise their political commitment, surging energy, and undeniable way with a hook and the band's strengths have made them one of the most revered punk bands ever. Their third album, 1995's ...And Out Come the Wolves, made them a platinum-selling sensation and an inescapable presence on MTV and modern rock radio. While they never translated that success into an enormous blockbuster record, that wasn't necessarily their ambition, choosing to stay with the independent punk label Epitaph and the creative freedom it allowed them. That decision helped them retain a large, devoted core audience as revivalist punk-pop began to slip off the mainstream's musical radar. Rancid was formed in 1991 by San Francisco Bay Area punk scenesters Tim Armstrong (guitar/vocals) and Matt Freeman (bass). Lifelong friends and longtime punk fans, the two had grown up together in the small, working-class town of Albany, near Berkeley; they'd also played together in the legendary ska-punk band Operation Ivy.
One of the cornerstone punk bands of the '90s, Rancid's unabashedly classicist sound drew heavily from the Clash's early records, echoing their left-leaning politics and fascination with ska, while adding a dash of essential hardcore crunch. Critics praise their political commitment, surging energy, and undeniable way with a hook and the band's strengths have made them one of the most revered punk bands ever. Their third album, 1995's ...And Out Come the Wolves, made them a platinum-selling sensation and an inescapable presence on MTV and modern rock radio. While they never translated that success into an enormous blockbuster record, that wasn't necessarily their ambition, choosing to stay with the independent punk label Epitaph and the creative freedom it allowed them. That decision helped them retain a large, devoted core audience as revivalist punk-pop began to slip off the mainstream's musical radar. Rancid was formed in 1991 by San Francisco Bay Area punk scenesters Tim Armstrong (guitar/vocals) and Matt Freeman (bass). Lifelong friends and longtime punk fans, the two had grown up together in the small, working-class town of Albany, near Berkeley; they'd also played together in the legendary ska-punk band Operation Ivy.
One of the cornerstone punk bands of the '90s, Rancid's unabashedly classicist sound drew heavily from the Clash's early records, echoing their left-leaning politics and fascination with ska, while adding a dash of essential hardcore crunch. Critics praise their political commitment, surging energy, and undeniable way with a hook and the band's strengths have made them one of the most revered punk bands ever. Their third album, 1995's ...And Out Come the Wolves, made them a platinum-selling sensation and an inescapable presence on MTV and modern rock radio. While they never translated that success into an enormous blockbuster record, that wasn't necessarily their ambition, choosing to stay with the independent punk label Epitaph and the creative freedom it allowed them. That decision helped them retain a large, devoted core audience as revivalist punk-pop began to slip off the mainstream's musical radar. Rancid was formed in 1991 by San Francisco Bay Area punk scenesters Tim Armstrong (guitar/vocals) and Matt Freeman (bass). Lifelong friends and longtime punk fans, the two had grown up together in the small, working-class town of Albany, near Berkeley; they'd also played together in the legendary ska-punk band Operation Ivy.
