This Will Be Our Summer

Bastards Of Fate

Vampires Are Real And Palpable

This Will Be Our Summer

***The revolution starts here. You didn’t think anything new—that is to say, genuinely new, a paradigm shift—was going to come out of Brooklyn did you? At this point? Tucked into the mountains of southwest Virginia, Roanoke is a city of shadows and mist. THE BASTARDS FO FATE didn’t move there to become famous—they were born there, to grow up obscure. But as the release of their second album, Vampires are Real and Palpable, approaches, the band’s reputation continues to spread like a well-executed piece of vandalism. The Bastards make music for the 21st century, and possibly—if we make it that far as a species—the 22nd, It’s a cluttered screaming cacophony of connected isolation. ‘Winter of Our Discontent’ may be the bleakest, most emotionally wrecked thing you’ll hear all year, and ‘Own It’ might be the funniest—funny the way Kafka is funny, and bleak the way Bataille is bleak. Or is it the other way around? I guess we’re trying to say that Bastards write like novelists, that they sing with the soul of a choir, and they sound like nothing else on earth. Vampires is a darker, altogether more desperate affair than 2012’s Who’s a Fuzzy Buddy, sounding less like a studio project and more like a band. It captures the visceral energy of their live shows—a chaotic mess of lightbulbs and screaming. Vampires laughs in the face of its demons; it scowls & weeps when confronted with angels.

Kleenex Girl Wonder

Let It Buffer

This Will Be Our Summer

***The twelfth KLEENEX GIRL WONDER album, Let It Buffer represents another step forward for the full-band experience: the songs are densely lean (with), critically emotional, and all but guaranteed to get stuck in your head. Lead single "Thelema & Louise" transforms an esoteric pun into a treatise on the perils of chaos and sex magicks, while street single "William Roberts" is a rap song in rock song's clothing about the tender line between evoking emotional responses and laughter. In between, KGW packs in 7-syllable rhymes by the hectare and evokes The Spin Doctors (musically) and Chavez and The-Dream (literally—all three in the same song). Basically, you can bet you’re going to get your art criticism’s worth by spending an afternoon with this baby.

Your Heart Breaks

Harsh Tokes & Bong Jokes

This Will Be Our Summer

***In the spare, messy style of YOUR HEART BREAKS, Harsh Tokes & Bong Jokes” is a nostalgic chronicle of the twins of youth: romance and rebellion. With the perspective that years bring, songwriter CLYDE PETERSON weaves melodies out of teenage trouble and innocence, songs in which we can all recognize ourselves. Imagine yourself getting high on a playground merry-go-round, having snuck out the first floor window of your ranch house in your neighborhood with no sidewalks because it was built during a time when people believed no one would ever walk anywhere again. Imagine enjoying it. Featuring THEO HILTON (NANA GRIZOL, MUSIC TAPES, DEFIANCE OHIO), KARL BLAU (D+, MIRAH, MOUTN EERIE), and JARED GANDY (WITCHES).

Bastards Of Fate

Who’s A Fuzzy Buddy

This Will Be Our Summer

***The year was 2006. DOUG CHEATWOOD—grocer by day, innkeep by night, musician perpetual—assembled his dream team. BENJAMIN PUGH as rhythm guitarist extraordinaire. CAMELLIA DELK on synthesizer and heart strings, and JASON WELLZ as sinister bass-smith. Tying the package together: the wild rhythms of DOUGH SHELOR’s pin-point percussion. A quintet of such skill seemed unstoppable, and yet Fate conspired against the Bastards from their inception. Their shows would end in mechanical catastrophe. Their wild antics would get them banned from popular venues. Their practice space burned to cinders, destroying their equipment. Their new practice space was set upon by bandits who swiped the very nails from the walls. It seemed as though a shadowy, malevolent force had THE BASTARDS OF FATE in its eye and would stop at nothing to see them rent asunder. And yet tragedy did not stop or slow The Bastards; if anything, it informed their unique musical sensibility. And now, at the end of their Road of Trials, we find their debut album. Who’s a Fuzzy Buddy? represents The Bastards of Fate at the top of their game, twelve tracks of catchy melodies, shrieking vocals, sonic weirdness. One cannot describe their sound accurately as all comparison fails; they have created a New Sound that is not of this generation of music, nor perhaps even of this plane of existence. You can listen to the album now, or you can listen to its influence in the future. The Bastards of Fate will not be denied.

Dead Dog

Dead Dog

This Will Be Our Summer

***DEAD DOG play with their amps too loud, drink-spillin', kitty-lovin', hot dog-eatin', guitar freak outs. Started in 2006 in Brooklyn with their first drummer SKIPPY, microwaving roaches and playing Queen covers in the living room. Shortly after releasing their first album, ELLA and JOHN drove south to Athens GA for the winter, never to return. The band joined up with Das Hangar Collective for Unfinished Arts, and returned to life with drummer LEXIE acting as the ying-yang to their yin and yang. They recorded their second album, Don't Touch Me in Chattanooga TN in spring 2010. Since 2008, Dead Dog has toured across the USA, and despite broken guitars, broken fingers, and many ruined underpants, never missed a show. They have played their brand of pop-punk woven with squealing feedback, distorted girl vocals, and heavy drums to one hundred basements from San Diego to Portland, Maine and from Miami to Portland, Oregon. This Will Be Our Summer has repressed Dead Dog's hot and heavy first release with bonus material.