Marnie Stern
Marnie Stern
(Kill Rock Stars)

Marnie Stern’s third album offers plenty of her dazzling guitar technique, kinetic interplay with drummer Zach Hill, and songs bursting at the seams with ideas. This time she’s also focused on crafting more immediately memorable tunes, such as the anthemic rocker “Building A Body” and explosively tongue-tied “Cinco De Mayo.” Stern also slows down to accentuate the lovely melodies and keening riffs of “Transparency Is the New Mystery” and “The Things You Notice.”

The new songs deliver more emotional heft, centering on themes of loss and doubt. “For Ash” is about a dead ex-boyfriend, but the messy stuff of grief is juxtaposed against a surging grid of guitars and beats. Throughout, Marnie Stern packs emotional and musical urgency designed to make your head spin and heart rate triple. Like the best rock, these songs dare listeners to keep up and match their intensity. —Jeff Jackson

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Hot Black
Rock n’ Roll Will Destroy Your Life
(independent)

Few bands carry the torch lit by Motorhead the way Hot Black does—frontman “Airwolf” has even cultivated such lycanthropic facial hair as to give Lemmy Kilmister a run for his cursed shillings.

This CD continues but skillfully refines the Hot Black tradition of extreme rocking at hyper-speed. The rhythms are tighter than a new mom’s pre-pregnancy pants after Thanksgiving dinner, and there are slick, riff-tastic breaks, stops and accents performed so fucking fast that they truly put these guys in a league with Slayer or Mother’s Milk-era Red Hot Chili Peppers (average song length: two minutes). With track titles like “Pussy Igniter,” “Stealin’ a Camaro” and “Oh Sweet Death,” they certainly haven’t gone soft in the lyrical department either. Playing in this band must be like constantly living on the verge of a heart attack. —Tom Sturm

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The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza
Danza III: The Series of Unfortunate Events
(Blackmarket Activities)

Highly anticipated after the opus The Electric Boogaloo, The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza’s latest lives up to expectations but falls short on the hype front. The Tennessee trio prides itself on formulaic onslaughts characterized by down-tuned visceral assaults, manic time changes, and liberal use of crunchy breakdowns. The group experiments with cinematic one-chord choruses on many of the tracks, allowing for an unexpected emotional shift within the usual Danza progression—this is heard in the first tracks, those which have a blatant disregard for sonic cohesion. Among these are “Yippie-Kay-Yay Motherfucker” and the anthemic “The Lost and Damned.” Long-time fans will find plenty to rave about, but the album becomes predictable and bland after the first six tracks.  —Paul Bachand