Aural Fixations

BRENDAN BENSON
The Alternative to Love
(V2)
Here at High Bias Multi-Mega Incorporated, we get promos. That's part of the understood deal with the record company folks: they send us all the unlabeled, cardboard-sleeved, cracked jewel-cased CDs we can stand, and we write glowingly about the good ones. Once in a while we wake up in a pool of our own bodily fluids and discover we've written glowingly about some of the others. Remind us to work on that.

Brendan Benson, though, is different: I buy his stuff. And please don't take that to sound sanctimonious from a guy who gets so many freebies. Without backing myself into a defensive position, let's just say that the amount of money I pour into the music industry is proportionate to the ringing in my ears.

I bought the oft-overlooked, brilliantly warped One Mississippi and the splendid Lapalco, and now I've purchased The Alternative to Love, even when I knew a promo was in the mail. This is the music you keep. (more)

DINOSAUR JR.
Dinosaur
You're Living All Over Me
Bug
(Merge)
Dinosaur Jr. was such a staple of the alternative rock landscape in the 90s that it's hard to remember that what the Massachusetts trio was doing was absolutely groundbreaking. Melding appealing melody with appalling noise was hardly a new idea when Dinosaur emerged in the mid -80s from the wreckage of hardcore band Deep Wound—the band's fellow New Englanders in Mission of Burma had already blazed a few trails. But the way guitarist/vocalist J Mascis, bassist Lou Barlow and drummer Murph played with dynamics was more extreme than anything that had come before. (more)

ROGER JOSEPH MANNING, JR.
Solid State Warrior
(Weed)
Gather 'round, boys and girls, while I tell you a story.

Now, who here has heard of Roger Manning, Jr.? I see a few hands. Okay, how about Imperial Drag? What? No one? Jellyfish maybe? You? Really? No, Jellyfish, not Spongebob Squarepants. (more)

THE SOUNDTRACK OF OUR LIVES
Origin Vol. 1
(Republic/Universal)
For a lot of rock & roll fans, the arrival of the latest record by The Soundtrack of Our Lives, one of Sweden's greatest exports, is a major event. (You'll have to ask Universal why they decided to delay it a few months.) Fortunately for those of us who resent having hopes dashed, Origin Vol. 1 doesn't disappoint. (more)