Blaqk Audio
Cexcells
(Interscope)
Sometimes a record comes out that redefines mediocrity. Cexcells, the debut album from AFI electro pop side project Blaqk Audio, is just such a record. Davey Havok and Jade Puget, the duo behind this electro-turd, are evidently allergic to original ideas. They borrow keyboard sequences and sounds from Soft Cell, the Eurhythmics and the wretched '90s techno collection Jock Jams. Havok's overwrought self-pity party vocals make Depeche Mode's David Gahan seem like Glenn Danzig. Also, I'll hate them forever for how their cutesy misspelled name forced me to run spell-check twice.
—Adam Bulger
Karl Blau
Dance Positive
(Marriage)
Karl Blau is probably best known as a collaborator with the talented songwriter Laura Veirs. He's also worked with cult favorite Little Wings. But Blau, who runs a mail-order project for many of his off-the-radar recordings, is a formidable sui generis solo talent. Here Blau puts his quirky and eclectic DIY stamp on the songs of Beat Happening's Bret Lunsford. Dubbed-out skeletal percussion, synth squiggles, fleeting tinklings, dinky-yet-danceable grooves and wobbly horns float around Blau's layered vocals. It evokes the Latin Playboys, the oddball Los Lobos side project, but there's really no one like Karl Blau.
—John Adamian
Christian Kiefer
Dogs and Donkeys
(Undertow Music)
Christian Kiefer has been releasing records (compilations, sessions and otherwise) since 1999. His '07 release features walk-ons by Wilco's Nels Cline, the Band's Garth Hudson and a couple of the dudes from Low. The record is a mellow one, but not at all boring, and its early-Wilcoism contributes to its charm, as do Kiefer's lyrics, which are full of kings and lovers and rivers and trees. Kiefer describes this album as being an "economic" one, which sounds a little mysterious—but nonetheless, the low-key vocals combine nicely with simple tunes and dreamy, "economic" lyrics.
— Brianna Snyder
1990s
Cookies
(Rough Trade)
If there is a line between genius and idiocy, the band 1990s walks a cocky, semi-drunken strut with one foot on each side. John McKeown, frontman of this Glasgow trio, used to make the rounds of the indie scene with his former band the Yummy Fur. Some of his bandmates formed Franz Ferdinand, and McKeown was evidently left to drink booze, take drugs, and hang out at bars. With 1990s, he's transformed the experience into deliriously catchy rock and roll with swagger and snarl, conjuring every great New York band that ever made being a junkie sound inspired. "Arcade Precinct," with its well deployed hand claps, evokes Lou Reed. And you should probably just go download "Weed," the hilarious and infectious pot-head paranoia anthem—just trust me.
—John Adamian
