Album Reviews

The Shivas Find New Momentum on an Album About Malaise

The Shivas’ new album, “Dark Thoughts,” a strident Tender Loving Empire debut, represents a shift. It’s 40 minutes and 13 songs’ worth of catharsis and, more than any previous Shivas release, offers a snapshot of the band.

Y La Bamba’s New EP is the Portland Band’s Biggest Reckoning Yet

On the two releases the band has put out this year, Mendoza has begun to use the project to express more directly what she’s been trying to overcome as a queer Latinx artist in the Pacific Northwest.

Reyna Tropical’s New EP is Dedicated to an Environmentally Threatened River in Columbia

The music of Sol y Lluvia is so vivid, it’s practically scenic.

Cat Hoch’s Debut Album Blends Psych Rock with ’80s Dance Pop

The future of Hoch’s sound feels less clear now than it ever did, but her keen songwriting chops have rendered that immaterial

Blue Tomorrows’ Debut Album Captures the Feeling of Being Young and Adrift

The lyrics capture the time between adolescence and adulthood, between nostalgia over what has been and daydreams of what could be. Each song fades into the next, creating an immersive soundscape for listeners to get lost in, and to get lost to. On “Sonoma Mt. Rd. (Deep Summer),” Nienaber sings, “Burn the map I don’t need/’Cause you said I’d know where to go.”

On Their New Album, Sleater-Kinney Faces Political Turmoil and Intraband Uncertainty

The Center Won’t Hold begins to feel like an album that replaces the personal with the political, though it’s less a plea for change and more of a badge of suffering. Maybe Tucker and Brownstein do really feel like obscene, broken bodies dragging themselves through an obscene, broken world. They’re hardly the only ones. But increasingly, it seems as though pain and torment have become synonymous with relevance and authenticity, which is not always accurate and often shitty

On Her Debut Album, “D.Y.K.E.,” KayelaJ Tackles Her Inner Demons

An acronym for “Don’t yield, keep enduring,” D.Y.K.E. reveals much of what Johnson strove through. Over masterly crafted beats from local producers like Sir Nai and Blangblanglang, Johnson goes hard on bars about realizing her sexual orientation and, subsequently, getting played by straight girls and Instagram models, how black men don’t support black women, and abuse and depression. She pleads how her confessions are for black people and for queer people on the acoustic, slow-bop opener “For You,” making it clear the songs that follow are ones both groups can relate to.

On Their Debut Album, No Aloha Starts to Carve Out Their Own Surf-Rock Niche

From the get-go, Okay Alone shares DNA with the likes of Dum Dum Girls and Best Coast. The patient strums and finger snaps of “In Your Car,” the stacked harmonies and shakers of “The Big One” all set the stage for a breezy album that keeps its preoccupations with relationship strife and impending cataclysm at a safe distance. The arrangements finally begin to open up on “Green,” an introspective track that finds founding duo Brette Irish and Blake Ferrin finally trading the terroir of sunny Southern California for that of their native Pacific Northwest.

On Her Debut Album, Portland Soul Singer Blossom Stops Questioning Herself

Her fluid sense of genre is present on every single she’s released. But with her long-awaited debut record, Maybe, she shares an even deeper command of her multidimensional songwriting. Chiddick’s album weaves through classic ’90s R&B rhythms and chill, relaxed beats. Maybe is about much more than its genre lineage, though—it’s like a compact memoir, driven by its lyrical content.

On Their New Album, Ages and Ages Uses Upbeat Pop to Deliver Lyrics About Hopelessness

Me You They We’s disaffected worldview is a long way from the bright-eyed perseverance of “Divisionary (Do the Right Thing),” the Portland band’s 2014 breakout single. Still, the album begins optimistically enough with “Way Back In,” a playful nugget of soul pop that finds Perry delving into his psyche with the hope of emerging resolute. Despite its lyrics about emotional clutter, “Way Back In” sounds clear and determined. Taut percussion drives tidy layers of pianos, strings and multitracked vocal harmonies, resulting in a classic indie-baroque sound in the vein of Dr. Dog and Spoon.

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