Fanfarlo in action. Photo by kata rokkar on Flickr, licensed under Creative Commons.

Fanfarlo sounds familiar. With all the press the band has received for its unassuming orchestral indie pop, the London-based quintet has permeated blogs and radio with its well-crafted songs ornate enough to catch your ear, but laid back enough to show you a good time.

But even if you haven’t heard the band’s name before, it’s easy to pick out sonic references: opening track “I’m A Pilot,” with its repetitive piano progression and crunchy drums, sounds like Cold War Kids doing a cover of the National. The second song, “Ghosts,” with strummed acoustic guitars and prominent trumpet recalls Neutral Milk Hotel at times, an apt comparison for a band that does such a flawless cover of “In the Aeroplane Over the Sea.” Lead singer Simon Balthazar’s vocal performance is familiar too, recalling Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s Alec Ounsworth’s distinct singing — sometimes incomprehensible, but still strong enough to hold all the right notes.

While Fanfarlo isn’t the first band to bring those styles to indie rock, the amount of ground they cover is impressive. The first three songs alone utilize music boxes, full string sections, horns, synthesizers and tempo shifts. “Luna” begins as one of the punkier numbers, but its frantic pace is nowhere to be found four minutes later as the song’s dramatic build-up quickly cuts to just an acoustic guitar and a trumpet solo. “Comets” has some unclassifiable instruments, too. Before you can decide if you’re hearing creepy background vocals, a stringed instrument, or maybe a theremin, the song approaches New Pornographers territory with its male-female harmonies and spurts of power pop.

With all of this crammed into 11 songs in just over 40 minutes, it’s easy to picture the band dropping instruments and scrambling to pick new ones up while recording the album. And with the way “Comets” leads rights into “Fire Escape,” without iTunes to guide you, it’s possible to easily miss where one song ends and another begins.

The downside to Reservoir is that they cover all this ground a little too quickly. By the album’s halfway mark, the band has already shown off every quirky instrument and pulled enough tempo changes that little comes as a surprise. The songs could be just rearranged in any order and the album would feel the same. That’s not to say similarity sacrifices quality — it just means the most memorable songs will likely be the first ones you hear.

Despite the pros and cons of the cohesion, if you don’t pay close enough attention, you might miss some of the more dynamic and pleasing moments on the album. “Drowning Men,” with its hand-claps and throbbing baseline, is easily the album’s catchiest track and makes great use of the string sections. The song’s rhythm section is enough to carry the weight of the song, but violinist Cathy Lucas adds a moody color that proves Fanfarlo’s strings aren’t just a stage prop.

“Finish Line,” which starts like almost any other song the record, has a danceable but short-lived synth breakdown, while the delicate album closer “Good Morning Midnight,” a minute and a half of thoughtful guitar picking and ambient keyboards, melodically has the most staying power. With Reservoir, you’ll enjoy how it begins and how it ends — the rest will be a fond, if distant memory.

Interview with frontman Simon Balthazar

There’s a lot of mention in the press about all the different instruments featured on the album. Did you set out to be unconventional, or did those choices come naturally?

The way we arrange our songs is just something that comes natural, we’re just guided by what we feel the songs need. For our album we didn’t feel like using electric guitars much, but instead we used [a lot of] musical saw, clarinet and mandolin, as well as toy pianos, trash cans and a bunch of vintage organs.

There are parts on the record where it seems like a lot is going on in terms of all the instruments. Is it easy to reproduce the record live, or do you find you have to scale the show down with only five people in the band?

We don’t necessarily set out to copy what we did on the record, but we’ve kept a lot of the arrangements for live use, which means carting around a lot of instruments and swapping mid-song.

After being on tour with Snow Patrol, you’re starting to tour in the U.S. in support of the album. Is there a different mindset that comes with being your own headliner?

We’ve spent a fair amount of time on the road doing our own shows, so the massive arena shows with Snow Patrol were more the exception. We really prefer playing smaller shows where you can actually connect with people. The current tour we’re on is certainly different from our recent tour of big cities though. This time we’re driving through loads of small towns, which is going to be really interesting hopefully.

Your website features all sorts of acoustic covers in what you call “Laptop Sessions.” Is this an important creative outlet for the band?

It’s more a document of us hanging out, playing around, covering songs we like. So it’s almost a social thing, but yes, there is an interesting creative element to playing other people’s songs, you find new perspectives on music. It’s the most obvious, basic way of expanding what you do and how most people first learn how to make music.

A lot of the videos feature the band playing in all sorts of random locations outside. What’s the weirdest place you’ve played?

Years ago we played on this cross between a monument and a stage, this big monstrous thing looked like a big fuchsia and was sat in a square. A friend asked us to play and we were short on cash so we did it. It was a lunch time and very strange.

You guys keep a pretty extensive tour diary. As a band that’s just breaking through, do you find that you’re documenting more for yourself and the band or for new fans?

A bit of both. We were pretty good at keeping a video diary not so long ago and it was really cool to revisit stuff we sometimes didn’t even realize had been filmed.

You posted pictures of when security tried to stop you from playing outside at Glasgow University. What’s the craziest thing to happen to you on tour?

I can tell you, but I’d have to kill you.

Reservoir was for sale for $1 on your website for the first part of the year. Did Radiohead’s pay-what-you want approach to In Rainbows pave the way for this, or was it something you had been planning all along?

It was just something we did for the hell of it. I guess also we were thinking — hey, this is how much we’d make per record anyway if were signed to a major!

You’ve self-released music in the past, but Reservoir now has the support of Canvasback Music and Atlantic Records. Was there a particular point where you realized a label would be helpful?

They were just really keen and could offer us the means to go out touring properly so it made sense. It was definitely a good thing for us to stay independent for a long time though.

There are more and more bands starting to self-release music. Do you think that’s where indie music is headed? To not just be on an independent label but to have no label at all?

I’ve definitely seen this trend for a while now. In the same it’s getting easier for people to record records without spending a ton of money, it’s getting easier to get the music out there and do your own thing without needing the stamp of approval from the industry. At the end of the day it’s good for music and creativity in some ways, but it also means it’s harder to make a living as a musician because you have to take more risks.

Dan Deacon performs in Chicago at Logan Square Auditorium. Photo by author.

What I experienced at Logan Square Auditorium was pure, unadulterated madness. I knew that this concert was going to be crazy, given my previous experience at Lollapalooza with Dan Deacon, but I was wholly unprepared for what I went through this time around. A simple rave, this most certainly was not.

Much of the insanity resulted from the fact that, by some miracle, this concert was an all ages event. There are many privileges that people under 18 should be allowed to enjoy. Going to this concert though, should not be one of them. It was a perfect lesson in what not to do as an audience member. These drunk and drugged teens started thrashing around before the opening acts even took the stage. Then, in an even weirder display, they started breaking apart glow sticks to paint their bodies with the neon substance. A couple of guys were trying to draw satanic pentagrams on themselves. Another was idiotically trying to color his own tongue, disregarding the potential safety hazards. I can’t count the number of times that the stuff got flung into my face. A friend of mine who came with me was on the verge of starting a fight after being body-slammed innumerable times. I know it was Halloween, but that doesn’t excuse the spectators from their simply atrocious etiquette.

I know I’m making the event sound like a shit-show, so far. And it was. But it was a pretty fun one. In terms of the music itself, I found the concert to actually be fairly sub par. The two opening acts, Nuclear Power Plants and some other group whose name I couldn’t get, played some messy, repetitive stuff that I couldn’t get into. I obviously enjoyed Dan Deacon’s music a lot more, but even then, his set list wasn’t exactly a crowd-pleaser. He played some stuff that isn’t on any of his albums, and a lot more fuzzed-out “noise” material. What he did have going for him was awesome crowd interaction and stage presence. True to his style, Deacon got the audience involved with some ridiculous tasks, including an incomprehensible interpretive dance, and the worst dance-off of all time. In between the games was some good, old-fashioned moshing. For just a little while, people really didn’t care about how they looked, hyper-actively bouncing up and down and flailing their bodies in whatever way they felt like as Deacon chipmunk-shrieked into his microphone.

It’s hard to describe, but your state of consciousness is somewhat altered during a Dan Deacon set, with no need of assistance from hallucinogens. Collectively, the audience moshed into one heaping mass of ecstasy, temporarily liberated from the universe of rationality outside the venue. In fact, I personally found this to be less of a concert, and more of a general, multifaceted experience. As opposed to being the main draw, the music arguably takes a backseat to the moshing. After a while, the man could have started blasting out anything, and the crowd would still probably be getting crazy, just to keep the crazy going.

So was the concert worth it? Was it worth putting up with the deranged kids, body-slamming and flying glow stick liquid? I’d have to give a resounding “hell yes.” Even if you don’t quite gel with Deacon’s music, it’s nice to be in an atmosphere where you’re free to spazz out without having to worry about appearances. So, if you get a chance to see Dan Deacon, don’t stay home and pass up an awesome chance to let loose unless you’re absolutely claustrophobic. I’d gladly go through that awesome mess again.

Sisters Tegan and Sara step it up in Sainthood, the duo’s sixth release. Photo courtesy of the band website.

Tegan and Sara isn’t the same band you used to know. Unless you’re a devoted fan or a frequent Stereogum visitor, the last you probably heard of them was almost six years ago when the Canadian twin set made a minor dent in alternative radio with the indie rock sing-a-long “Walking With A Ghost” off their 2004 breakthrough, So Jealous. But after another studio album and multiple headlining tours under their belts, Tegan and Sara have stepped up their sound and songwriting for their sixth album, Sainthood, co-produced by Death Cab For Cutie guitarist Chris Walla, who also produced the band’s last album, 2007’s The Con.

While The Con incorporated home-recorded demos from the sisters’ isolated songwriting sessions on their respective coasts (Tegan in Vancouver, Sara in Montreal), the approach also generated a more polarized sound: the album’s songs mostly alternated between Tegan’s rapid-fire power pop and Sara’s moodier, intricate compositions. With Sainthood, however, the band avoided following in the footsteps of OutKast’s Speakerboxxx/The Love Below and opted for a live band approach to recording, rehearsing for several hours a day before recording the songs. The result is a tighter, more aggressive body of work, evident in the lead single “Hell,” one of three songs co-written with AFI’s bassist Hunter Burgan. “Hell” combines the edge of Paramore with the band’s endearing take on love and heartbreak.

Recording together live instead of from their respective homes succeeded in smoothing out some of that songwriting polarization. Those familiar with the band’s prior catalog will likely recognize which sister wrote which song, but cuts like “Sentimental Tune,” a simple, guitar-driven Sara song that could just as easily been written by Tegan will make it harder for new fans to tell their music apart. Seemingly symbolic of this cohesion is “Paperback Head,” the only song so far to have writing duties split evenly among the two of them.

That’s not to say Tegan and Sara have abandoned what makes them unique — Tegan still churns out songs like “Northshore,” a two minute power chord-fest complete with addictive, stream-of-consciousness lyrics, while Sara still crafts intricate, quirky pop songs, such as the piano-driven and single-worthy “Alligator.” The sisters’ trademark vocal harmonies are also just as prevalent as ever, but are less necessary than before. Tegan’s voice is strong enough to carry the weight of most of her tunes completely solo, like on the pounding “Don’t Rush,” while Sara’s layered vocals, more of an acquired taste than her sister’s, can still run thin on songs like album highlight “On Directing.”

Unlike The Con, whose lyrical content focused on anxious, desperate pleas to change the minds of unrequited lovers, Sainthood takes a calmer, more calculated approach to practicing perfection to win over hearts. While The Con’s final song “Call It Off” ended the album on a defeated note with lines like “Maybe I could have been something you’d be good at,” Sainthood closes with some optimism. “Someday” features MGMT-esque synthesizers and a free-form delivery that weaves hopeful determination into similar lyrics like “Might do something I’ll be proud of someday / Mark my words, I might be something someday.” They may not be saints yet, but with an album like Sainthood, they’ve already done something to be proud of.

You may have heard of them if:

• You watch Entourage. (“Lisztomania” plays at the end of this last season finale.)
• You watch SNL. (They were the musical guest in April.)
• You watch late night TV. (They’ve graced Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon with “Lisztomania” and David Letterman and Conan O’Brien with “1901″.)
• You watch Gossip Girl. (The DJ played “1901” at Georgina’s rooftop party in The Freshmen and “1901” also plays in the Sonic Youth episode.)
• You watch Royal Pains. (“Lisztomania” is the intro song in an episode of RP’s debut season.)
• You watch Cougar Town. (“Lisztomania” can be heard during the season premiere.)
• You are a 2010 Cadillac SRX enthusiast. (“1901” is the background track for its current commercial.)
• You are a movie trailer enthusiast. (“Lisztomania” and “1901” were featured in trailers for Where the Wilds Things Are and New York, I Love You, respectively.)
• You are really into anything French. (They are, in fact, from Versailles)
• You read any music publication. (Everyone’s crazy about them.)

You may like them if you like: Vampire Weekend, MGMT, Passion Pit, Animal Collective, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Grizzly Bear, Fleet Foxes, pop-culture, French guys, etc.

Fresh off Rolling Stone’s Hot List, Phoenix has quickly gone from underground indie to super pop breakthrough of the year. The four frenchmen got their start doing a back up mix for Air and have made five kick-ass albums (one being their live album) since.

Comprised of Thomas Mars (vocals), Deck D’Arcy (bass), Laurent Brancowitz (guitar) and Christian Mazzalai (guitar), Phoenix has been slowly making their way to wide international recognition since 2000. With United creeping into the French charts in 2000 and their sophomore album Alphabetical dominating Norwegian and Swedish charts in 2004, this year, they’ve successfully infiltrated the charts in over ten countries, reaching the top 25 in six.

One of Phoenix’s greatest talents is how natural they make every transition. You can notice the change from verse to chorus, song to song and album to album, but it sounds like a perfectly natural course of action. They make good music sound easy and carefree, which is what great pop should do. They’ve perfected this art with Wolfgang Amaedus Phoenix and clearly broken through the international barrier and won the hearts and minds of a U.S. audience.

The album bounds forth energetically with the ball of energy that is “Lisztomania.” With a bouncy backbeat and playful chords, the song tears a page out of a history book with a reference to renown musician and teacher, Franz Liszt. Through this clever comparison, Mars takes us through the thrill of playing a concert and being adored, (“think less but see it grow, like a riot, like a riot, oh!”) if only for a few minutes.

“1901” continues the history lesson with a dedication to 19th century France. With a little more edge to it than the opener, “1901” plays up the synth as we realize “it’s not what you say, what you say is way too complicated.” The two singles are really complimentary in some respects as the clear stand out tracks of the album. But that’s not to say the other eight tracks aren’t rock your socks poptacular.

The album takes a dream-like turn with “Fences,” which is like an homage to the quartet’s Air days, and continues the approach to the two part instrumental interlude, “Love Like a Sunset.”

As you embark into the second half of the album, the boys play a little love tune about a lost love that’s really not all that depressing. They power on into “Rome,” where the band wails on as Mars claims “always and forevermore I call to say I’m on the way” as the ashes fall, fall, fall.

Then we reach “Countdown,” the only true heartbreaker of the album. Once you hear the question, “Do you remember when 21 years was old?” you can’t help but feel the pangs of nostalgia creep up inside you. But the fiery symbols and Mars’ dying to be sincere lyrics swear it’s “better than it looks.”

Next comes a fairly bouncy break up song with a quick backbeat simply titled “Girlfriend” which sounds more optimistic than melancholy. And for the finale, “Armistice” explores the compromise of “lovers in a rush” which seems to be okay to all parties involved.

Phoenix cooks up vicarious living and nostalgia and conjures up images of sunsets and childhood into a 36 minute pot of energetic beats and quirky chords. Our new masters of pop craftsmanship can make any situation sound like a good time and in these tough times, that’s exactly what we need.

WNUR is the largest student-run station in the country, according to WNUR representatives. The station sets itself apart by aiming to play music that is underrepresented by most outlets, seating more and more independent music each year.

“We try to play music that if we weren’t playing it, you wouldn’t hear it anywhere else,” says Doug Kaplan, a Communication junior and general manager of WNUR.

This kickoff concert is the first one for WNUR in recent years and will hopefully increase awareness of the station.

“We’re better known in the community than in the school, so we’re just [trying] to gain awareness for WNUR and have fun,” Kaplan says.

The concert will also work to help integrate new DJs into the station and get them excited about the year to come. Prepping a concert is a side of the radio station that’s different from the day-to-day schedule of shows.

“It’s a different aspect of getting to work with a radio station,” says Kate Watson, a Weinberg junior and the phonathon director for WNUR. “Not just doing your own show, but doing promotions and planning events.”

This year’s concert features two local bands, Owen and Joan of Arc. The bands individually feature the Kinsella brothers, Mike and Tim respectively, who have been active and influential members of the Chicago music scene since the mid-’90s. The Kinsellas have been playing in bands together for years: Cap’n Owl, Joan of Arc and Owls, to name a few.

Owen, Mike Kinsella’s solo project, will take the stage at 3 p.m. Listeners can expect a mellow, folk-based sound with plenty of acoustics. Mike’s softer sound might segue oddly into Joan of Arc’s harsher, experimental indie rock. Tim Kinsella is Joan of Arc’s only permanent member. Since the band is not a very active project, it has an elastic, continually shifting 11-person lineup. People can expect around five or six performers for Sunday.

“They’re really important local bands that we’ve been playing on WNUR for years,” Kaplan said. “They’re bands we really like, that are fun and that are popular in Chicago.”

The concert will be broadcast live on WNUR, 89.3 FM or streamed online. In case of rain or unseasonably cold temperature, the concert will be moved to the Louis Room. Students interested in WNUR should contact the general manager at gm@wnur.org.

“I look better sweaty,” said Jeff Pezzati, of local punk band Naked Raygun.  The lead singer was remarking on a rumor that heavy metal bands allow photographers to take pictures only during the first songs of concerts, before the artists begin to sweat.  Pezzati then invited the concert photographers to take pictures as long as they pleased.  They did not, however, take the singer up on his offer, noticing the mosh pit of young fans beginning to form around them.

Naked Raygun headlined the third night of the fifth annual Riot Fest punk festival at Metro on Friday.  Riot Fest was started in 2005, by Mike Petryshyn, a punk fan who set out to create a show that he would want to attend.  For its fifth year, the festival featured concerts at the Congress Theater, Metro, Subterranean, Beat Kitchen, Cobra Lounge and Liars Club from Wednesday to Sunday.

The show started slow, with opening acts Wax and No Empathy playing to a small crowd. This small crowd consisted of mostly fans over 30, but was sprinkled with the occasional young punk, complete with jean jacket and torn jeans.  The younger audience members looked like the older fans must have back in the ’80s and ’90s, before giving up the punk aesthetic for the middle-aged-professional look they chose now.  These punks of the past preferred the balcony and back of the main floor, while the new guard skanked, shoved, and crowd surfed their way to the front as Metro filled up.  By the time the third opening act, a reunited Rights of the Accused, took the stage, the sold-out show was packed.

Rights of the Accused can be best described as a punk rock party band.  Their music was fast, energetic and straight to the point, without much of anything else in between.  Lead singer Mike O’Connell, head shaved, wearing a shiny silver suit complete with blue fringe, was reminiscent of Gary Glitter (of Rock and Roll Part II fame).  O’Connell mentioned his fashion resemblance to Mr. Glitter a number of times during their set.  The band was also joined on stage by two men, one in a banana suit and the other dressed as a gorilla, who would occasionally hold up signs with “Hey!” written on them.

After the entertaining, but overall musically uninspiring set from ROTA, Naked Raygun took the stage.  Formed in 1980, it was one of the first bands to combine hardcore punk with melodic songwriting, a blend which was very present in their Riot Fest performance, which featured prominent lead guitar lines from guitarist Bill Stephens.  The performance had very few frills.  There were no costumes, and when the band wasn’t playing, Pezzati spoke casually with the crowd.  But they didn’t need costumes.  Naked Raygun simply played their well written, honest songs, including two new previously unreleased tracks, much to the audience’s delight.  Naked Raygun is highly regarded in the Chicago punk world, and singer Pezzati and original guitarist Santiago Durango were also members of Northwestern alum Steve Albini’s influential Chicago band, Big Black.  The band, after going through a number of lineup changes, broke up in 1992, but reunited for the 2006 Riotfest, and now employs festival founder Petryshyn as manager.

Naked Raygun’s performance on Friday not only proved the band’s strong influence on Chicago punk, but proved that it had not faded almost 30 years later.  Riot Fest too is only gaining in popularity.  This year’s festival featured national acts NOFX, Alkaline Trio and the Butthole Surfers.  Another Riot Fest was to be held in Los Angeles too, but was postponed until spring of 2010 due to Petryshyn’s health problems.

But the Naked Raygun was no doubt the star of the Metro’s concert on Friday.  Besides putting on a tight, well-performed show, they represented an often unseen side of punk rock.  The four members of Naked Raygun were not the intimidating, foul smelling stereotypes of the artists associated with the term “punk.”  They didn’t have green mohawks.  Their arms were not lined with track marks from Heroin abuse.  They just seemed like nice guys.  A young teenage girl and a young boy sat off to the side of the stage with their mother, obviously the family of one of the band members.  Singer Pezzati just seemed gracious to be on stage.  The Naked Raygun were just nice guys.  Nice guys that enjoyed playing their loud music.

Bublé takes a grab at country (“Heartache Tonight”), Nat King Cole (“Stardust”) and Dean Martin (“You’re Nobody Till Somebody Loves You”), with some new arrangements (such as a Hans Zimmer feel for “Cry Me a River,” a James Bond feel for “Georgia on My Mind”, and a 1960s pop feel for “Some Kind of Wonderful”) that give each song a new “twist,” but it’s not that twisted. He sings with guest singers, such Naturally 7, Ron Sexsmith and, one of my favorites, Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings. Like his other songs, it doesn’t sound like he works with the band — more just like singing along. His song choices create an eclectic song playlist that is novel, using standards that haven’t been seen in the charts lately.

Throughout, he bounces from sounding like Frank Sinatra, Josh Groban, Harry Connick Jr., Mel Tormé (vocally and because of song arrangements), Ella Fitzgerald — with minimal scatting — and then Michael Bublé (for his non-covers). He also stays relatively safe with his song choices, such as starting the CD with a slightly-forgotten classic, “Cry Me a River” that sounds very similar to the first on his last CD, “Feeling Good.”

One of the two original and non-cover songs, “Haven’t Met You Yet,” I predict will be the next “Everything,” and will soon be the new popular songs across a cappella groups. Like “Everything,” it’s cute, poppy, a lot of fun and really nice to listen to, even though it initially sounds like a song from High School Musical. It’s less like the elevator music, being more original with a newer sound — with an homage to the Beatles (“Love, Love, Love” and a marching band interlude) — than the others that makes his CD worthy.

At least he’s trying with different sounds and good repertoire. I’m still making the $10 dent in my iTunes account.

Rating: A-

When I went into Schubas Tavern on Oct. 11, I knew next to nothing about Drug Rug, Hockey or even the headlining act, Portugal. The Man. By the time I finally left the venue, I came away with three more bands I’ll be sure to follow religiously.

Drug Rug, out of Massachusetts, kicked off the show with a melodic grouping of bluesy songs. Hockey, out of Oregon, followed, upping the ante with a barrage of infectious new wave dance that left a pleasantly surprised audience clamoring for more. And just when I thought the concert couldn’t get any better, Portugal. The Man, hailing from infamous Wasilla, Alaska, made their entrance, guitars ablaze.

I usually don’t like it when bands take up time at a show for extended “audience interaction,” which usually consists of trivial, drawn-out small talk. Just play the damn music. And that is exactly what Portugal. The Man did over the course of an animated hour. Beginning with a discordant assault on the ears the captured the lounging audience’s attention, reducing what was once a lucid and well-spoken collection of people into a mob of illogical, thrashing heads. Helped by a brilliant, seizure-inducing lighting setup and the sick acoustics at Schubas, Portugal. The Man’s avant-garde take on classic rock instantaneously arrested my senses.

I had previously only heard one of the songs they played, “People Say,” so I couldn’t sing along much, which usually is a killer for me in terms of concert enjoyment. But in this case, it didn’t matter at all. With John Baldwin Gourley’s falsetto wailing resonating through the air, backed by some thrilling instrumentation and improvisation, I’m going to go out on a wild limb that any enthusiast of rock would’ve had a dandy time that night. I’m frankly amazed the band brought as much energy and oomph as they did. As they were coming right off a show the previous night, I was expecting somewhat of a downer, but they blew away all my expectations. When they finally left after their encore, flooded with sweat, the audience, myself included, deservingly gave them a rousing ovation, full of “fuck yeah!”s, for their exhausting performance.

By any means, go see Portugal. The Man live when you have the opportunity. If this can be taken as a measure of quality, my neck is still sore from all the headbanging I did that night.

Grade: B+

Full disclosure: I have always been a rabid Alice in Chains fan. But I have to admit, I wanted to hate this CD. A new release after lead singer Layne Staley’s death didn’t seem right to me. However, Black Gives Way To Blue has seriously grown on me, and I urge anyone who is a fan of the band or of the genre to give it a try.

No band blends painful, tortured lyrics together with grungy, distorted riffs in quite the same way as Alice in Chains. With lyrics like, “I want you to kill me, and dig me under/I want to live no more” from 1992’s “Dirt,” Alice in Chains seems like another whiny emo band; very cliché now over 15 years later. But strangely enough, the band seems to be the one of only ones that can pull off such depressing lyrics without the music sounding hokey.

Alice in Chains was started in Seattle in 1987 by lead singer Layne Staley and guitarist Jerry Cantrell. Two of their albums topped the Billboard charts, 1994’s Jar of Flies and 1995’s Alice in Chains. They have had 11 top ten songs, and six Grammy nominations. Along with Nirvana, Soundgarden, and Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains was one of the frontrunners of the grunge scene, and one of the most successful rock bands in the 1990s. You might know them from songs such as “Them Bones” and “Man In The Box,” which can be heard on Guitar Hero and Rockband today.

That being said, Alice in Chains is no longer the same raw, disturbed band that it was in the mid-90s. Tragically, lead singer Layne Staley died of an overdose spurred by his depression in 2002. Without Staley, the band went on hiatus for three years, and then reunited with new lead singer William Duvall. Black Gives Way To Blue is the band’s first studio album in 14 years.

With new singer Duvall, the band has a completely new sound. While still pulling from its grunge and heavy metal roots, the sound is more polished. Black Gives Way To Blue lacks the pure emotion that Layne Staley’s vocals brought, but yet it brings something completely new.

It’s easier to compare the new CD to Jerry Cantrell’s solo album, Degradation Trip. Both are full of the powerful riffs and dramatic lyrics that Cantrell has always written, but both seem to be longing for Staley. Appropriate, since both mourn the death of the late singer in many of the tracks. In addition to familiar riffs, Cantrell takes lead vocals on many songs in Black Gives Way To Blue, which helps the sound seem more familiar to old fans.

Duvall’s strength is also his weakness: he sounds a bit like Staley. He has the same vocal power and amazing vibrato that Staley possessed, but he lacks the fierce pain that always came through in Staley’s songs. However, he sounds great in concert on all of the old tracks, and blends in well with the remaining core members of Alice in Chains: Sean Kinney, Mike Inez and Jerry Cantrell. The core trio is perhaps what makes this dynamic work: Alice in Chains is similar enough to appease old fans, but Duvall’s fresh blood gives the band appeal to new fans as well, and shakes up the sound. The result? An album that sounds familiar, yet nothing like any album the band has put out before.

The opening track “All Secrets Known” really grabs the listener in and uses the same distorted but beautiful melodies that Jerry Cantrell is known for. Crooning, “There’s no going back to the place we started from,” Cantrell brings up the death of Staley and lets fans know that it’s “time to start living” by playing again without him. The single, “Check My Brain,” initially sounds a little generic. But I urge listeners to revisit it. It is so catchy; it will definitely grow on you. “A Looking In View” is one of the strongest tracks on the album. At over seven minutes, it is a grunge epic with extremely heavy riffs and strong drum beats. “When The Sun Rose Again” is reminiscent of Jar of Flies, combining melancholy lyrics with beautiful, somewhat sad melodies. Both of these tracks sound most like the old Alice in Chains, so old fans will approve. The closing track “Black Gives Way To Blue” is the slowest track on the album. The chorus of “Lay down, black gives way to blue/Lay down, I’ll remember you” seems a perfect way to pay tribute to the late Staley, and to end the album.

Layne Staley was the epitome of a tortured artist, and it’s fair to say Alice in Chains will never sound quite the same without him. However, Black Gives Way To Blue soars despite his absence.

So who are these guys? From Los Angeles, California, Shawn and Adam Stern are not only musicians, but also businessmen. As a way to show a more positive take on the punk scene, the Stern brothers started their own record label in 1981, called BYO Records (for Better Youth Organization), at the tender ages of 19 and 20. In addition to BYO, the brothers also ran the Godzilla Nightclub, which housed both local and national punk acts.

The Stern brothers’ goal was to get all of the punks involved in an ethic of “do it yourself”, or DIY. A Gandhi-like ideal, the point of DIY is simple: No one is going to change the world for you, so you have to do it yourself.

Youth Brigade performed this past weekend as a part of Riot Fest, a three-day punk rock festival in multiple venues across Chicago. In addition to their set, Youth Brigade also screened a film called Let Them Know, which celebrates the birth of BYO Records and the band that has influenced so many others to this day.

Shawn Stern, the lead vocalist and founding member of Youth Brigade and BYO, sat down with us to discuss the film and the release of the band’s new box set, which celebrates the more than 25 years of influence that the band has had on the punk scene

Tell us about the box set. What is in it, and why did you choose to release it?

Well, it was our 25-year anniversary coming up (this was a few years ago), and me and my brother were talking [about what we should do]. We started the label [BYO Records] with a compilation and we thought, “Let’s do a compilation; that’s a great idea.” Bands tend to not want to give you brand-new songs, even though that would be ideal, so we said, let’s ask everybody to cover a song from our catalog — it’s gotta be, I don’t know, a thousand songs, right? Then of course all labels these days are faced with the problem [...] of everybody’s downloading music, so labels are kind of obsolete. And we thought, what could we do to try and make something that kids can’t download, make it something new. And then we thought, “Let’s make it a book. A coffee table book, with two LPs shoved inside.”

What is it like being in a literal band of brothers?

(Laughs) Well, it’s just me and Mark now because Adam’s busy doing stuff. He went to Parsons, he’s a really good illustrator. But that was back in the 80s, and then he started learning all of the computer stuff, and so that’s what he does now, computer CGI. He worked on that movie, Pan’s Labyrinth, and that HBO John Adams special that they won an Emmy for.

The film Let Them Know was screened as a part of Riot Fest this weekend. Tell us about the film and what you hope to accomplish with it.

We saw films and books over the last 15 years and they all tend to focus on London and New York. Everyone ignores LA, but the fact is, LA has had the largest punk rock scene since the 80s. Most films are made by fans, and that’s great, but they weren’t there, you know, they weren’t a part of the band. So we came up with the idea of this documentary on the label. We’re good friends with Bouncing Souls, we just did 12 shows with them in Canada, and they did one, and the guys who made it did a really good job, so we started talking about it with them.

What is punk to you?

Punk is just about thinking for yourself and looking around the world and seeing what’s wrong with it, and trying to change things. Back when we started, DIY (do it yourself) wasn’t a term, we just did it. We didn’t think about it. Punk isn’t just a fashion statement, it’s a way of living, and trying to change the world around you.

You guys grew up in California. How did the atmosphere there impact the kind of music you make?

We were surfers. We learned how to surf when we were 12 or 13 years old. Surfing has always had such a rebel culture connected to it, and I think that’s what influenced us. You know, skateboarding came out of surfing, and there’s this culture of rebellion connected with that today.

You have been involved in the punk scene for about three decades. How do you feel about that?

Lucky that I’m still able to do this and that people are still interested. I never thought I’d still be doing this into my 30s and 40s.

How has music changed since you started?

It’s comparing apples and oranges. It’s hard because it seems like everything’s been done before. It’s amazing, the quality. Back then no one had any piercings or crazy hair, and now everyone does. There weren’t very many bands, but they were all good. Now you have thousands of bands, but they all sound generic. But a lot of that has to do with electronic recording. Everyone can do it, but just because you can doesn’t mean you should. I find punk to be more intelligent music; it has a message behind it, not like all the generic pop out there.

Youth Brigade was one of the first bands to break into the European underground music scene. How does the concert atmosphere compare between Europe and the United States?

Well, they drink a lot more (laughs). It’s not so much about Europe as a whole, because every country is different there. But overall, it’s just so much more laid back in Europe. There’s too much police shit here.

Does Youth Brigade have any plans or goals for the future?

Our plans are always to go out and play shows in cities where we can surf. Other than that, hopefully I can write some new music. We’re going to come out with a new record soon, ‘cause it’s been a long fucking time.

What do you hope fans get from Youth Brigade and other bands on the BYO label?

I hope they have a good time, because that’s always important. But if you feel inspired listening to our music, if you feel like you can change things that you see wrong in the world, then I think we’ve accomplished what we’re trying to do.