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The members of Dropkick Murphys aren’t short on famous friends. Besides collaborating with Shane MacGowan and having their now-ubiquitous Woody Guthrie adaptation, “I’m Shipping Up To Boston,” appear on the soundtrack to Martin Scorsese’s The Departed, the stalwart Boston punk band can legitimately claim The Boss as a fan. In fact, Bruce Springsteen lends his gruffest, crustiest vocals to “Peg O’ My Heart,” a revved-up version of the Ziegfeld Follies song that appears on Going Out In Style, the band’s seventh album. It’s a blast, and Springsteen’s presence is nothing less than intoxicating. But the rest of the disc brings the ruckus. From the Pogues-like frenzy of the title track—which features a slightly less exciting cameo from NOFX’s Fat Mike—to the mandolin-and-bagpipe-soaked anachronism of “Sunday Hardcore Matinee,” a bruising celebration of the ’80s hardcore scene, Style is nearly indistinguishable from Dropkick Murphys’ last few releases. And that’s a good thing. Thuggish, tongue-in-cheek, and never short on brass-knuckle hooks, the disc proves that—regardless of the Springsteen boost—the group still shoots for the pub more than the public at large. But besides being one more fun and heartfelt slab of well-crafted, Celtic-rooted punk, Going Out In Style serves another purpose: It provides that much more source material for Mark Wahlberg’s inevitable Dropkick Murphys biopic.-AV CLUB

OTHER NEW VINYL RELEASES:

Blueprint, Adventures In Counter-Culture
Cold Cave, Cherish The Light Years
Coheed & Cambria, Second Stage Turbine Blade
Kills, Blood Pressures
Maritime, Human Hearts

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Four-song EPs usually serve as stopgaps between full-length albums, and they usually fall into three categories: collections of subpar material deemed unworthy of inclusion on the previous release, tantalizing tastes of things to come or the culmination of musical experimentation. The four tracks on Broken Bells‘ “Meyrin Fields” EP are stranger creatures than anything that appeared on James Mercer and Danger Mouse’s 2010 debut — an indication that the duo is prepared to make music that genuinely deserves to exist outside the shadow of either Danger Mouse’s Gnarls Barkley or Mercer’s other band, The Shins.

Broken Bells gets down to business with the title track, a bracing polyrhythmic song in which Mercer alternates between the two extremes of his substantial vocal range as Danger Mouse churns out bursts of clatter and atmosphere. Even better is “Windows,” bolstered by R&B rhythms, hard-funk guitar and Mercer’s dizzying falsetto. “An Easy Life” dips into fuzztone tropicalia — music for vacationing robots — and the set closes with the harder-edged shimmer of “Heartless Empire,” the one track in which Mercer seems to be pining for his erstwhile Shins gig.

At this point, Broken Bells and its status as an ongoing concern merits serious consideration. With Cee Lo Green doing just fine with his solo career and the shake-ups in the Shins lineup, Danger Mouse and Mercer might make this their day jobs rather than their moonlighting gig. “Meyrin Fields” indicates that both parties seem interested in expanding Broken Bells‘ smooth electro-pop into new sonic territory and keeping our heads ringing. –NOK

OTHER NEW VINYL RELEASES:

Radiohead, King Of Limbs
Deadmau5, 4X4=12
Mike Watt, Hyphenated-Man
Peter, Bjorn and John, Gimme Some
Amon Amarth, Surtur Rising
Lupe Fiasco, Lasers
Mountain Goats, All Eternals Deck
Pete Yorn, Musicforthemorningafter
And MORE!

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Most live records don’t capture the primal, poetic power that Soundgarden’s Live on I5 does.

In fact, most studio records don’t either, but that’s another story. Recorded over various dates during the west coast leg of Soundgarden’s 1996 tour, Live on I5 is the legendary band’s very first proper live release, and it stands alongside their classic albums Louder Than Love, Badmotorfinger, superunknown, and Down on the Upside proudly. There’s an urgency to the recording, and you can practically hear guitar god Kim Thayil picking the meandering riff during opener, “Spoonman.” An older gem, “Searching with my Good Eye Closed,” builds with a rhythmic darkness from drummer Matt Cameron’s polyrhythmic pummeling and Ben Shepherd’s brooding bass lines. At the heart of the sonic maelstrom, Chris Cornell bleeds every inch of his soul into each into each note of “Let Me Drown” and the psychedelically invasive Superunknown standout “Head Down.” There’s a paranoid sensitivity pulsating through these live renditions that takes hold of the record and doesn’t let go—just like everything the band’s done. –AD

OTHER NEW VINYL RELEASES:

The Strokes, Angles
Soundgarden, Telephantasm: A retrospective
Burzum, Daudi Baldrs
Lupe Fiasco, Lasers
Dead Kennedys, Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables
Dead Kennedys, Give Me Convenience Or Give Me Death
Defeater, Empty Days & Sleepless Nights
Yeallowcard, When You’re Through Thinking Say Yes

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