Quick Hits, Vol. 36 (Drenge, Waxahatchee, Sufjan Stevens, Meganaut)

In case you didn't see it, 365thingsaustin.com did a pretty funny April Fools ACL lineup release that a friend actually brought to me to ask if it was real.  By the time I read the third line, I remembered it was April 1.  "Uh, Bob Marley is dead, dude.  So is Stevie Ray."

Drenge - Undertow.  Yes!  Love these dudes.  Thick, meaty rock and roll in the grungy spirit of the early 90's music I once loved.  Their last album (2014's Drenge) was also a good one, and this keeps up the same spirit of basic face-melting with drums, bass, guitar, vocals.  No prissy new wave synth flourishes.  No drum machines or trap clicks.  Just the real deal.

This tune (We Can Do What We Want) is off the new album and it is more Arctic Monkeys-style party rock than the rest of the album (and that video is crazy) but you get the idea.  This is made to rock out and take no prisoners.  Bring it.  Awesome.

Waxahatchee - Ivy Tripp.  Fuzzy rock and roll alternative.  I thought their last album was solid and interesting (2013's Cerulean Salt) and this one is likewise really well done.  The band name made me think maybe they were a Texas band, but this is apparently a gal named Katie Crutchfield who named her band after a lake in Alabama.  This is good, crunchy, lo-fi rock.

"The brick house that you built around your cranium, you wear it like a crown"  Nothing fancy, but I dig the sound and lyrics and the whole deal.  Sweet.

Sufjan Stevens - Carrie & Lowell.  This is not my normal cup of tea, but I have to say that the start of this album is as purely beautiful as anything I have heard in forever.  The softest tenor weaving through plucking guitar (or maybe mandolin?) melody.  Achingly lovely.  I read somewhere that this album is about/dedicated to the death of his mother and memories of her.  If so, this is truly an amazing response to something so sad.  Yeah, the rest of this album is similarly gorgeous.  I rarely go out of my way for pretty things, I want a little more fuzz on my music, but this one is hard to put down.  Here is the second track, "Should Have Known Better"

Meganaut - Meganaut.  Ha!  Speaking of some fuzz, this one opens up with a full-on assault by death-ray guitars.  No song on here has more than a thousand listens, but it is funny, hard-charging garage rock that is actually kind of kick ass.  No frills, no great lyrics, no good voice, just pummeling and snarling and a set of huge swinging balls crushing everything not made of steel.  If you want to take a nap or hold your baby in your arms while cooing sweetly, play Sufjan Stevens.  If you want to irrationally rock out and break things with your pelvis, then play this thing.