It's been a while. This column hasn't existed since March, which is fine. No one missed it. Parquet Courts - Wide Awake! (2018) It's almost more coveted in indie rock to become a consistent band than a successful one. Of course, blowing up overnight and getting massive acclaim over one record is probably fantastic, but then every subsequent album is a disappointment. Consistency, on the other hand, means that each album is good-to-great, and everyone's left satisfied and smiling. Parquet Courts is the representative from New York by way of Texas in the "good indie" Olympics. Wide Awake! keeps the trend going with another collection of witty, political, punk-funk. The political angle specifically is emphasized, because of course it is. That being said, the band offers a lot of clever insights about why 2018 (and most other years) sucks in this country. Grizzly Bear - Yellow House (2006) The Indieheads subreddit had a folk-off this ...

Another week, another crop of albums! The only thing that is constant is the crushing passage of time! CHVRCHES - Love Is Dead (Glassnote) The third album from Glasgow electro-pop trio is sure to be their most divisive. Enlisting outside producers (Greg Kurstin, Steve Mac) for the first time, the band described the new material as "the most pop stuff we've done." The quartet of singles released in advance prove this statement and show the more explicitly aggressive and political side of their sound, especially in Lauren Mayberry's lyrics. 2015's Every Open Eye was the group's latest release. Love Is Dead features Matt Berninger of The National. Listen on Spotify here . Listen on Apple Music here . Pusha-T - DAYTONA (G.O.O.D. Music/Def Jam) The legendary coke rap MC and G.O.O.D. Music president is finally releasing his third studio album. Formerly titled King Push , it is the first of the five albums announced by Kanye Wes...

For this weeks installment of "In Pursuit of Something Interesting," we are keeping it local and looking at Double Grave's Empty Hands EP. I stumbled across a video taken by UnderCurrentMLPS of the band playing at a club in Minneapolis and was stuck by the bands mix of sludgy noise rock and pop hooks. An easy comparison can be made between Double Grave and the legendary indie rock band Dinosaur Jr. Both are heavy, noisy, and poppy all at the same time. Jumping into "Empty Hands" the listener is greeted with dissonant chords soaked in reverb and served up with some punchy drum beats. "Rapture," the opening track, had an unexpected breakdown in the middle of it, which was great. The song itself is only one minute and 28 seconds long. So, the amount of sonic and structural diversity found in it is mildly impressive. The one critique I have with the song is the vocal production. The vocals sort of float through the ether of track. It's hard to ...

  Existence is an exercise in futility, yet here I am doing this anyways! Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks - Sparkle Hard (Matador) Seventh album from the former Pavement frontman's millennium band. Described as "bear[ing] less obvious relation to what's come before," Sparkle Hard features a fiddle and Kim Gordon (vocals on "Refute"), among other things. The band's last album was 2014's Wig Out at Jagbags . Singles include "Middle America" and "Shiggy." Listen on Spotify here. Listen on Apple Music here. Courtney Barnett - Tell Me How You Really Feel (Milk!/Mom + Pop) GAS - Rausch (Kompakt) Quiet Slang - Everything Matters But No One Is Listening (Polyvinyl) Parquet Courts - Wide Awake! (Rough Trade) Frog Eyes - Violet Psalms (Paper Bag) Ryley Walker - Deafman Glance (Dead Oceans)

We're back baby! I'm still depressed, but now I have free time! That's an improvement, I guess. Beach House - 7 (Sub Pop) Aptly-titled seventh record from the dream pop masters. The new album features percussion from tour drummer James Barone and "production" from Peter Kember, aka Spacemen 3's Sonic Boom. This is the band's first album without producer Chris Coady in a decade. Last year, Beach House released their B-Sides and Rarities compilation; their last studio albums came as 2015's one-two punch of Depression Cherry and Thank Your Lucky Stars. 7 includes "Lemon Glow," "Dive," and "Dark Spring." Listen on Spotify here . Listen on Apple Music here . Mark Kozelek - Mark Kozelek (Caldo Verde) Seems like the Koz is taking it slow this year. After dropping four albums last year (one Sun Kil Moon double LP, a collaboration with Jesu, a collaboration with Parquet Courts' Sean Yeaton, and a collabora...

Full disclosure: I have had this record for over a year. I saw it in the back of a crate full of local releases while shopping for Record Store Day and was intrigued by the name Dingus and the record's cover. The photo of three dudes sitting in inner-tubes and the name Who Cares? called to me. So I bought it, listened to it like one-and-a-half times and put it on the shelf with my countless other records. Since this column is all about crate digging and finding new tunes, I thought it would fit in perfectly. Grabbing it off the shelf and dusting it off, I could not for the life of me remember what  Who Cares? sounded like. I knew it was a pop punk album but that was it. As the Dingus launches into "Irob," the bands technical abilities are made abundantly clear. The band's guitarist throws in some major riffage that adds melody you likely would not find on a Midwestern pop-punk song. The very next track features an intro that almost sounds like a chamber ensembl...

Taken From Father John Misty's Facebook It has been a little over a year and a month since Father John Misty (Josh Tillman) released his critically acclaimed third studio album Pure Comedy . However, the cynical bearded folk man did not wait long before releasing new music. "Mr. Tillman" was released in February of this year and was followed up by two more singles. All of the songs released will be part of Tillman's new album God's Favorite Customer . One thing you won't find Father John Misty doing during this album cycle is any of the typical press, social media posts, or publicity stunts. He has been completely silent about the new album, but that does not mean Tillman won't be making the usual rounds playing singles from  God's Favorite Customer on the late night talk shows. On Monday the 7th, Tillman performed "Mr. Tillman" along with the New York City Gay Men's Chorus on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. The performanc...

Ear Coffee may have a New Music Friday article, but that does not mean we are able to catch all the music released that week. This is especially true when bands randomly releasing music on like a Saturday night (I'm looking at you Death Grips). So every week, presumably released on Mondays, there will be an article chronicling the singles, music videos, and "other stuff" that was released during the week. To kick off the list is the new single from Florence and The Machine called "Hunger." This song follows up the first single "Sky Full Of Song" from Florence Welch's forth coming album High as Hope .  The new album is a follow up to her 2015 album How Big How Blue How Beautiful . Both "Hunger" and "Sky Full Of Song" sound like musical cousins to the bands last album; however, the new material seem to be the melancholy cousin to  How Big How Blue How Beautiful. High as Hope will be out June 29th via Republic Records.  ...

Deerhunter announced that their new cassette only release Double Dream of Spring will be exclusive to their upcoming tour of the US and Europe. Recorded at Bradford Cox's home in Atlanta, the cassette contains 10-tracks and will be limited to 300 copies. Along with the announcement of  Double Dream of Spring the band announced that they begun work on a new album that will be released later this year. This tour only release follows in line with the bands cassette only releases of  On Platts Eyott Island  in 2008 and 2009's Rainwater Cassette Exchange .  You can find the bands full tour itinerary here  and Double Dream of Spring 's track-list below.  Part I. 1. Clorox Creek Chorus 2. Dial's Metal Patterns 3.  4. Strang's Glacier Part II. 5. The Primitive Baptists 6. Denim Opera 7. Lilacs In Motor Oil 8. Faulkner's Dance 9. How German Is It? 10. Serenity 1919 ( Ives )

You didn't think we would make it to six plus episodes did you? To be honest, neither did we. To celebrate this momentous occasion we dug out an interview that Ear Coffee's Joe Keyport did with Calvin Heights in September of 2017. The band had just released Worst Calligraphy and had just begun to work on their  newly announced album Talented Sun . This interview really pulls back the curtain on the band as frontman Brett Carey discusses the shift of the bands sound from indie rock to experimental rock and his dislike of the earlier work that the band did. You can find the podcast on iTunes , Podbean , and on Stitcher .