Sell Out Records - A Music Review Blog

Jars of Clay "Much Afraid" - Available Here  Even though Jars of Clay received platinum certification for “Much Afraid” , and was at the eight spot on the Billboard charts when this came out, this album was seen as disappointing for a lot of fans. I wasn’t so quick to judge it. I was 14 years old when this came out, and I needed something to help me through a life in the suburbs. My family moved 40 miles north of Los Angeles to a place that I was unfamiliar with. The home was in shambles emotionally, with abuse running rampant, and this record had me comforted. We stopped going to church, but I held a spiritual element to my world, and the words of Jars of Clay seemed to fit holes in my proverbial bucket. It’s a softer record than their previous one, and while the singles that they put out had electric guitar, it was the lyrical and spiritual blends that made this one a stand out for me in my collection, at the time. A lot has changed since I first heard this record, but ...

The Fury of The Aquabats (1997)  From the very first thing that you hear on this record from 1997, you know you’re in for a fun time. The Aquabats are a ska band that got big in the 1990s and are still kicking today. They play a fun type of music where they are superheros and they take on the super villains. The songs all have a fun pace, mixing punk, third wave ska, and lots of great story telling. “The Fury of The Aquabats” was the first major exposure any of us punk kids got to a man by the name of Travis Barker. Surely, you don’t mean Travis Barker of Blink 182 fame, do you Jorge? Yes! That very same guy is on this record playing drums, long before Blink called him up, he was the drummer for this recording, and super group The Aquabats!

I didn’t hear “Clarity” from Jimmy Eat World until I was a senior in high school. I was late on this record because I didn’t really explore passed “Bleed American”, which was getting a lot of radio and MTV play at the time. I recall Carson Daly saying that these guys were one of the hardest working bands in the United States. They were in fact opening acts for a ton of tours, and they were coming into their own with the release of the poorly titled “Bleed American”, which saw a few title changes, and even censorship thanks to 2001’s events. “Clarity” is one of the best independent rock records every put together. However, it fits into the “emo” and “indie” mold all the same. It’s like Death Cab For Cutie’s brother, or cousin. The band flows through long winded songs, creating over an hour of music with just 15 songs on the expanded edition. These are not short songs at all, and they play through a lot of instrumentation, and sometimes, it seems a bit long. That’s the key to the in...

Millions of people still think of Nirvana’s unplugged album as one of the best MTV ever produced . MTV was a great channel once. I wasn’t allowed to watch it, but I did so anyways. It showcased a lot of music, and it helped me branch away from purely rock radio into new dimensions. I remember that in 1996 I wanted to pick up several records, and one of the major ones that I purchased was Alice in Chains “Unplugged”. This was recorded for MTV as they had a series in which they put rock groups in a small venue, put some candles on, and the band would play through their hits and some B-sides as well. What made this so special was that the band had been absent from the limelight for a while. In fact, they didn’t play a concert for 2 and a half years before this. Layne Staley would die soon after the band recorded this, but the band definitely put on a showcase here. I recall at the time, a lot of music critics didn’t like this record. In fact, my stepfather, friends that listened to ro...

Labor day, I hate it. No, I take it back. I don’t hate it. I just have found myself working on another holiday, and despite a nice weekend full of clients, I still feel the sting of bills and problems. It’s muggy here in Indianapolis, so what better way to celebrate another Monday than to reminisce about a record that came out in 2008 and taught me to grow up faster than I was developing. Beck put out “Modern Guilt” and I didn’t hear a lot of people talking about it . My coworkers at the time barely heard, with the exception of Will from Car Crash Set (say what’s up via Twitter here ). He always knew what was out, what was new, what sucked, and would be quick to tell me if something was lame. Then again, he was quick to also play unreleased music, b-sides, and so much more. Beck’s “Modern Guilt” is an interesting departure from what most people thought about the artist. Before this record came out I was listening to “Guero” in Santa Monica and Brentwood. My coworker at the time was ...

In June 1996 the band Stavesacre released an album that would become one of the most eclectic , strong, and impressive records of all time. I’m not alone in saying this. The Los Angeles Times would write of the band summing up the one line that I tell a lot of people about, “The Best Band No One’s Ever Heard Of”. It’s so true, and the guys in Stavesacre know this all too well. For all the work and incredible elements that they pushed through in their careers, they never got the mainstream success that they should’ve received. In fact, it was on “Friction” that comparisons to Tool started, and you know what? Tool should’ve had these guys open up for them, as they would have been huge! “Friction” starts powerfully with the track “Threshold”. This guitar and bass heavy track is precisely the same style that Tool and other prog-metal bands were putting out in the mid and late 1990s. From the opening track, you are taken on a progressive metal and hard rock ride that you cannot mirror a...