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How exactly does one go about following up a series of four concept albums on each of the elements, one of which was a loose adaptation of Moby Dick and the last three of which have sold in excess of 100,000 copies? If you’re Mastodon, it means letting loose and generally fucking around a bunch for that archetypal back-to-basics record, of course. Even as the term has devolved into little more than a trite press release buzzword in recent years, employed by everyone from Kylie Minogue, Metallica and a 30-years-washed-up Zombies to imply a big, shocking departure/return to form, it isn’t unheard of for an act to revert to their old ways for their best work in years.

In many ways though, The Hunter is very much a back-to-basics album, Mastodon’s most forward-thinking record yet that reprises the punchy force and (relatively) short track lengths of their 2004 opus Leviathan, while retaining many of the increasingly divergent qualities they’ve picked up along the way to album number five. Not that they’ve been around long enough to warrant cries for a return to form – and few wouldn’t argue that their last two records have been their best – but freed from the confines of elements and concept albums, Mastodon sounds fresher than ever. Single “The Curl of the Burl” opens to Brent Hinds’ snarl of “I killed a man ’cause he killed my goat, I put my hands around his throat!”, while the brutal “Bedazzled Fingernails” offers up another hilarious reminder that metal too can have a sense of humor (the band has previously scored Jonah Hex and written songs for the Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie). – Consequence of Sound

OTHER NEW VINYL RELEASES:

Pine Hill Haints Tales Of Crime (Pt. 1)
Five Finger Death Punch American Capitalist
Erkin Koray Methul: Singles & Rarities
White Rainbow Making Of Thriller
Blaze Foley Clay Pigeons
Indigo Girls Beauty Queen Sister
Terror Lowest Of The Low

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Oneohtrix Point Never‘s Replica must be some sort of masterpiece, an assessment quantifiable in terms of the outlandish metaphors and sci-fi jargon that bloggers and critics have already repurposed in order to describe it.

Whether you end up interpreting Replica in terms of Blade Runner or that music theory course you took back in college, it makes for a fascinating addition to the already-extensive OPN catalogue. Replica is of a piece with the synth-based drone of Rifts and Returnal, and like both of those albums, it owes much of its musicality to recurring arpeggio motifs. One of the odd paradoxes of ambient music is that a musician’s decision to incorporate more song-like elements into their work will almost always be welcomed by critics as evidence of maturation; if anything, OPN mastermind Daniel Lopatin seems to be resisting that trajectory, since nothing here matches the relatively overt pop gambit of Returnal’s title track. If Lopatin has made any concessions to accessibility this time out, they figure mostly into Replica‘s abstractly rhythmic qualities. With only one or two tracks employing anything like a beat, Lopatin’s fondness for cyclical phrasing nonetheless imbues his newest compositions with more body and direction than his previous work. And where actual percussion is employed, as on the coda to “Andro” or the title track’s recurring piano chords, the effect can be tremendous, as though the random functions of a few very noisy machines had spontaneously created something human. – Slant Magazine

OTHER NEW VINYL RELEASES:

DJ Shadow Less You Know The Better
Rush Rush Moving Pictures: Live 2011
Yuck Yuck
Owen Ghost Town
Craft Void
Animals As Leaders Weightless
Deep Purple Made In Europe
Noothgrush Live For Nothing

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With The Decemberists, it’s s safe bet that somewhere between the post-Brit-folk of Fairport Convention and Morrissey’s darkness, leader Colin Meloy will emerge with a collection of impossibly literate tales that embrace death, consider love’s perils and offer up a swirling pastiche of indie rock. Emotionally complex and lyrical seems the rule in a musicality that’s straightforward as it can be.

And Long Live The King, a six-song EP culled from songs recorded during the country-tinged The King Is Dead sessions, fits the template. Whether evoking the college radio swirl of The Waterboys and R.E.M., the gilded country rock stain of The Flying Burrito Brothers or the essence of ancient folk songs, The Decemberists find all roots fulfilling. – Paste

OTHER NEW VINYL RELEASES:

Coldplay Mylo Xyloto
Big Business Big Biz Quadruple Single
Ryan Adams Ashes & Fire
Journey Journey’s Greatest Hits
Journey Vol. 2 – Journey’s Greatest Hits
Panda Bear Tomboy 4LP Box Set
Matt Pond PA Emblems

Tags: new releasesvinylwhats playing