Interview by Melissa Payette Automatic Loveletter (ALL) is a band formed by singer/songwriter Juliet Simms. She now shares the stage with Ryan Metcalfe on drums and Tommy Simms on guitar. Juliet’s latest release titled ‘The Kids Will Take Their Monsters’ is an acoustic LP that brought her back to both her singing and song-writing roots after a tough previous couple [...]

Jane’s Addiction: The Great Escape Artist Jane’s Addiction is one of those bands who just should have left well enough alone.  After 1997’s ‘Kettle Whistle’ compilation, the subsequent feud/breakup/hiatus/end of the salad days should have been “it” for the band. Instead, 12 years after their first breakup and 6 years after the release of their farewell compilation, they released ‘Strays’.  [...]

Current Swell: Long Time Ago The Folk-Rock melodies on the fourth album by Toronto singer-songwriters Current Swell are simple and understated, smart and poetic.  There’s a sentimental, and sometimes bittersweet tinge to the music and lyrics. They’re a little too Country-Bluegrass for my taste, but they do it damn well on songs like the title track and opener, “Long Time [...]

Machine Head: Unto the Locust Album #7 from Machine head is one of the best sounding Metal albums I’ve heard this year.  Powerful, visceral lyrics, layered and complex musical composition, all performed by expert musicians and masters of their craft. Besides being a classic example of Metal grown from the soil of the mid 1990’s, ‘Unto The Locust’ is an [...]

Opeth: Heritage Album #10 is significantly different from anything else produced by the Swedish Metalheads, Opeth.  Instead of their usual musical hallmarks, on ‘Heritage’ Opeth have released something a little down-genre, blending Baroque instrumentation with traditional electric guitars.  They’ve also added a keyboard element and emphasis on bleak, clear vocalizations, creating a unique entry to their catalogue. They’ve also brought [...]

Lenny Kravitz: Black and White America You can forgive yourself the mistake, if you assumed from the title and lead track off this album made you think that Lenny Kravitz was about to tread into the murky waters of Race Relations; after all, that’s precisely where he goes with the eponymous opener. But, that’s also as far as he goes; [...]

Darlings of Chelsea: Panic is Worse than Emergency Listening to the first LP from this Toronto outfit, I find myself reminded of the Post-Grunge / Cali Skate Punk eras of Rock.  The fast-driving intense Rock recalls groups like The Offspring, or Foo Fighters (If Dave Grohl didn’t taint the group with his hellish douchebaggery). The songs are fast and frenetic, [...]

All Else Fails: The Oracle A couple of weeks back I commented on a group that was doing the whole Linkin Park soundalike thing, and how it annoyed me.  What annoyed me about it was that the band in question brought nothing new to the so-called “Nu-Metal” sound. I’m happy to say that’s not the case with All Else Fails [...]

There’s no question that Joss Stone has the voice and vocal talents that is necessary for the R&B and Soul that she sings.  The problem is, at least on LP 7, that Joss Stone just doesn’t sound convincing when she delivers the power vocals that permeate the tracks of LP1. Soul and R&B have always been about delivering emotion, not [...]

Black Tide: Post Mortem If you like your Metal to sound exactly like Linkin Park used to sound like back when they first formed, with slightly less screaming and rapping, then Black Tide’s second album ‘Post Mortem’ is for you. ‘Post Mortem’ sounds like it was designed for the Pop-Metal crowd, the songs interchangeably similar, with an angst-riddled desperation that [...]