Rites of Spring – End on End (1991 – Dischord)
Sometime during the four-year haze of my higher education, I was lucky enough to come away with a degree and an unlabeled cassette tape containing a dozen tracks of emotionally agressive hardcore by a band whose identity I did not know. I gave the tape to some friends whose encyclopedic knowledge of music surpassed mine, but the mystery group remained as such until the internet came along. I recently Googled the lyric that had particularly haunted me lo these many years: “I woke up this morning, with a piece of glass caught in my throat. Then I choked.” The mystery was solved– Washington, D.C.’s Rites of Spring. Manned by one-half of what would become Fugazi– Guy Picciotto (vocals, guitar) and Brendan Canty (drums)– I kicked myself for not being able to put it all together. It says here, that Rites of Spring are considered by some (who would besmirch their good name, I suppose) to be the first emo band. I wouldn’t go that far. But I would tell you that “For Want Of” is the cathartic aural equivalent of uncovering the seemingly indiscoverable.
Four Tet – Rounds (2003 – Domino)
Fridge guitarist Kiernan Hebden straps on a laptop and uses his experience as a post-rock composer to create organic, fresh-sounding electronic music that immediately trumps over-glitched experimentalists that populate the genre. Gorgeous melodies are built upon guitar and drum samples and keyboard loops that are, both alternatively and cooperatively, interspersed with hip-hop beats and Far Eastern mysticism. This album and Manitoba’s Up in Flames are taking seemingly inorganic music to greater, more tangible, levels.
The Mars Volta – De-loused in the Comatorium (6/24/03 – Universal)
Fans of At the Drive-In don’t need me to tell them that former ATDI-ers and current Mars Voltans Cedric Bixler and Omar Rodriguez like Led Zeppelin. A big-arena, heavy metal sound filtered through a melodic hardcore ethos, ala the aforementioned Fugazi, permeated that group’s output. With tMV, Bixler and Rodriguez have progressed, literally and figuratively, by incorporating jazzy, layered elements that recall Santana and King Crimson. The production, by Rick Rubin and Omar Rodriguez, is so good that it will make you forget the embarrassment you felt asking for this album by name.
