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Music

1. Comets on Fire: Avatar
With every album, Bay Area bad boys Comets on Fire just get better and better. Avatar has more of a classic-rock sound for the band, augmented by the chaos-punk-psych jams that ruled their earlier ...read more
2. Animal Collective: Feels
While critics found it easy to lump Animal Collective in with the freak folk scene after the strumming madness of Sung Tongs, Feels may cause them to revise their opinions -- slightly. First, this...read more
3. Animal Collective: Sung Tongs
On Sung Tongs, their first record distributed by FatCat, the two-man Animal Collective come on like sun-scorched acid eaters gathered around the campfire, strumming and grinning while they weave ...read more
4. Animal Collective: Here Comes the Indian
Informed in equal parts by acid-fried psychosis, crop-circle field recordings and an elephants-on-the-loose circus thrash aesthetic, Animal Collective's fourth full-length album rests roughly at t...read more
5. Akron/Family: Akron/Family
The debut from these Williamsburg freak-folksters was one of the best albums of 2005, an endlessly beautiful, rich and inventive record that established these youngsters as one of folk’s lead...read more
6. Robert Wyatt: Ruth Is Stranger Than Richard
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7. Six Organs of Admittance: The Sun Awakens
A fabulous and lush new album by Ben Chasny, a.k.a. Six Organs of Admittance. On this album, his second for the always reliable Drag City, Chasney takes us on many musical voyages into the lands o...read more
8. Comets on Fire: Blue Cathedral
Comets on Fire's Sub Pop debut is a modern psych-rock scorcher! And for this record they brought one of this era's greatest guitarists, Ben Chasny of Six Organs of Admittance, into the fold, with t...read more
9. Comets on Fire: Comets on Fire
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10. Dungen: Ta Det Lugnt
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11. The Flaming Lips: At War With the Mystics
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12. The Flaming Lips: Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell [EP]
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13. The Flaming Lips: Hear It Is
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14. Deerhunter: Cryptograms
Spectacular. Talk about a record coming out of nowhere! A surprisingly rockin’ record from Kranky, the label who in the past few years have been known for a steady output of electronica, ambi...read more
15. Woods: Songs of Shame
Words will never quite be enough for Woods. Not to suggest this Brooklyn outfit is The. Greatest. Thing. Ever!, just that when I tell you Songs of Shame is a collection of ramshackle floaty folk-ro...read more
16. Pisces: A Lovely Sight
One line-drive into the gap after another for the champs over at the Numero Group. Amid their unending soul, gospel and R&B excavations they uncover a true left-field odyssey-oddity that was ne...read more
17. Oneida: Rated O
Oneida, a band that has spent more than a decade mixing grand statements with grand absurdity, tops itself yet again with Rated O — a triple-disc (in both formats) release that is worthy thro...read more
18. The Flaming Lips: Embryonic
At War with the Mystics was a respectable placeholder, and instrumental soundtrack Christmas on Mars holds an auspicious place in the Flaming Lips’ catalogue, but to fans who’ve been waiting years ...read more
19. Irmin Schmidt: Kamasutra
The long-overdue reissue treatment finally comes to this drop-dead classic soundtrack, composed and performed by Irmin Schmidt and The Inner Space (which, less than a year later, would change their...read more
20. Yeasayer: Odd Blood
Yeasayer is the rare band these days that can take more than two years to follow-up a much-loved debut and find their fans waiting and hungry (as opposed to finding them moved on to something else)...read more
21. The Alps: Le Voyage
Style into substance -- that's the magical feat of San Francisco trio the Alps on their gently affecting (and at times subtly unnerving) fourth album, Le Voyage. This instrumental record provides o...read more
22. Noveller: Desert Fires
Noveller is the nom de guitar of Brooklynite Sarah Lipstate, whose last album, 2009's Red Rainbows, was a jarring, technicolor rampage through sculpted noise and crashing dynamics. For Desert Fires...read more
23. Black Mountain: Wilderness Heart
Sometimes it seems like Black Mountain is just toying with us -- such as within the first two minutes of "The Hair Song," the opening track on the Vancouver band's new album, Wilderness Heart. With...read more
24. Rikki Ililonga & Musi-O-Tunya: Dark Sunrise
On to Zambia we go, where frontman Rikki Ililonga and his Musi-O-Tunya band pioneered the sort-of genre known simply as Zamrock back in the '70s. As put forth on the awesome two-disc set Dark Sunri...read more
25. Sic Alps: Napa Asylum
Lazy, trippy and full of all-right-now kinda energy, Sic Alps slack their way back into our basement hearts with the acid sprawl of Napa Asylum, a 22-song album that clocks in at 47 minutes. Meanin...read more
26. Religious Knives: Smokescreen
Love this sound. Religious Knives are one of our favorite NYC psych outfits but their activity level suits a pair of parents and assorted other players: It happens when it does. On their debut for ...read more
27. Thee Oh Sees: Castlemania
Wait a minute, something is wrong here. Garage bands are not supposed to evolve. They are supposed to release album after album of simple guitar chords, tight drumming and hooks, hooks, hooks. That...read more
28. Boris: Heavy Rocks
Oh man, Boris is just doing whatever it pleases these days. For one of its two new releases (see also: Attention Please), the Japanese trio-plus (Ghost's Michio Kurihara frequently pitches in) has ...read more
29. Noveller: Glacial Glow
As in, that which may follow Desert Fires. Sound Fix fave Noveller delivers her fourth album, Glacial Glow, her most meditative effort yet. Crystallizing a direction in which she's been moving over...read more
30. White Hills: H-p1
I am a massive fan of the rock that is psychedelic, and honestly, I have never heard a White Hills record that blew me away—which is what all psych-rock fans want, to be blown to pieces by the stuf...read more
31. Ty Segall: Goodbye Bread
Ty Segall's weird and we dig it. His debut for Drag City is a killer rock record—just not the one we thought he was gonna make. In his past work for the Goner label (and others), Segall has shown a...read more
32. Amen Dunes: Through Donkey Jaw
There are "outdoor" records (especially in summer) and "indoor" records. The new Amen Dunes album is indoor and then some; Through Donkey Jaw is so internal that it feels a little awkward to play i...read more
33. Tame Impala: Innerspeaker
People have been coming into the store and asking about this album for more than a year. Even though Western Australia's hottest export since...since...well, I have no idea, sorry, but Perth quarte...read more
34. Fire! with Jim O'Rourke: Unreleased?
A monster record featuring some of planet Earth's heaviest hitters, the curiously named Unreleased? makes adventurous avant-jazz positively groove. The quartet -- Jim O'Rourke on guitar and synth, ...read more
35. The Men: Leave Home
Owners of the best first song on any rock record released this year -- you can take that to the bank -- NYC quartet the Men made a significant splash in 2011 with their first widely distributed alb...read more
36. Jakob Olausson: Morning & Sunrise
Fans of Six Organs of Admittance and the more haunted side of the acid-folk scene, this Swede's for you. Jakob Olausson is a farmer from the south of Sweden with a bracingly beautiful outlook on th...read more